Is This What You Were Looking For?

Several years ago, my wife and I had the privilege of being invited to the baptism of a young man who had been mildly involved in our youth group. He had since moved on to be a part of a different church in the area. It was a blessed day, with a blessed service, a blessed guest speaker and a blessed message. We gave him a personalized New Living Translation Bible, letting him know what a privilege it was to know him.

In that blessed hour, there was one thing I found to be rather odd. During his testimony, he shared how thankful he was for his new church, how there he had found the answers he was looking for to life’s big questions. It seemed like a wonderful thing to say on such a grand day. I don’t believe it was jealousy which thought his statement to be odd. I was overjoyed to see him follow Christ’s example in baptism, and if someone else was better able to get the job done, I wanted to commend my superior.

What I found strange was that in my time with him, he never asked any questions. If real answers were what he was really looking for, why did he never ask? As best I knew, the things I had given him were the very things found in scripture. I really was happy though. So I shook his hand, gave him a hug, told him how pleased I was with his decision to follow Christ, and that I loved him.

There is a problem with looking for answers. We generally discover what we set out to find. Obviously, the answers he had found didn’t quite do the trick. Within a couple of years, he had become a hardcore, conspiracy chasing atheist. So much for the new church with the better answers.

Looking for answers isn’t such a horror. Searching for answers is a good thing. I get this uncomfortable chill when I hear the phrase, ‘the answers I was looking for’.

Just because an answer satisfies you, does NOT make it true. In my career, (and maybe quite unfortunately in my calling) I have grown to be rather proficient at giving people ‘the answers they are looking for’. You may well know that I am the assistant manager at an automotive repair shop. I do everything I can to be forthcoming about what we are really doing to the vehicles our customers bring to us. The greatest challenge to maintaining that trust, comes with our provinces drive clean program.

If you live in southern Ontario, and follow the program in the media, you’ll know it has proven to be a terribly unpopular program. As a front counter person, I receive the brunt of the general public’s dissatisfaction. I have learned (unfortunately) to be very adept at giving people the kind of ‘answers they are looking for’.

Call me a coward. I deserve it. I’ve just given up. I tried giving the straight truth, but when I do, they complain to my boss that I’m short with them or insensitive. When my customer has an answer they are looking for, I have NEVER been able win the conversation. If I’m going to fight, lose absolutely every battle , and then be called short and insensitive, I just can’t see the hope of giving perfectly true answers. If there was a glimmer of hope, either of conveying truth, or living without fear of being labeled insensitive, I might be able to reclaim some of my personal integrity.

I’ll give you a plain example. Customer B’s car failed its emission test because its transmission isn’t shifting properly. Mr. B gets angry with me saying, “It’s a transmission code. That has nothing to do with my vehicle’s emissions.” If one in my position were to be upfront with Mr. B, he would say, “Actually sir. If the transmission isn’t shifting right, it will burn more fuel, thereby increasing CO2 emissions, and all other pollutants your vehicle produces.” There have been several occasions where I have explained it as such. Never has such a response been the kind of answer they were looking for. They walk away angry, thinking that I’m mean, and just want to take their money.

I have given up the fight. Please pray someday I will take up the fight again. The question I now normally ask myself is, “What kind of answer is Mr. B ‘looking for?’” I then tell him, “I don’t know why the government counts that as a problem in their emission testing program.” Then the strangest of things happens: It’s almost a miracle. Having found the answer he was looking for, he lets me fix his car, pays me, shakes my hand and walks out of the garage thinking I am such a swell guy. He walks away thinking I’m his friend, and the government is the devil.

What I’m sharing with you isn’t isolated to auto repair. Looking for answers that satisfy us is, in all likelihood, just as prevalent, and even more dangerous for our spiritual well being. We are a species who tend to accept what sounds agreeable to us, and reject what does not. The research we perform generally reflects the answers we were hoping to find from the onset. I was reading an interview of a well known Christian author who had just written his latest work. His claim for the book, was that it used scripture to develop a strong case for his thesis. Is that respectable? Should scripture be used as a thing to develop a case? I’m not about to expose the man. He is in fact among the more sound theologians of our day, and neither am I above using scripture for such a purpose.

God warned us in His word, through Paul speaking to Timothy, “a time is coming when people will no longer listen to sound and wholesome teaching. They will follow their own desires and will look for teachers who will tell them whatever their itching ears want to hear.” 2Timothy 4:3 I don’t know exactly what time Paul was referring to, but it certainly does describe our era.

Paul described a day when people would do what they want to do, and in order to feel okay about their lives, would gather teachers to themselves who would tell them what they want to hear. The internet has provided for us unprecedented wealth to accomplish just that. Before the printing press, we were limited to whoever was within earshot. We are now able, not only to buy our favorite books, but from the privacy of our own homes, download messages or sermons from whoever best suits our preference.

Are you an atheist? There is a plethora of information available that will help you to find encouragement in your course. Do you like muscle cars? Lots of stuff there too. Yet, car enthusiasts and atheists do not make up a significant segment of my readership. How about Christians type people?

I have confessed to you, that I have become proficient at giving the answers people ‘are looking for’ in my workplace. I’m wondering if I have subconsciously learned to do the same in my calling. This is a confession, not justification.

Whenever I hear 2Timothy 4:3 being quoted, it is normally in reference to individuals who want to indulge in good old fashioned wine women and song. The very thing that does the ear tickling varies completely from ear to ear, on person to person. If I want to tickle your ears, I will tell you very different things than if I am speaking with your neighbor. If I want to tickle the ears of a charismatic Christian, I will say other things to a cessationist Christian. (And yes. I believe Christ-ians might be found in both camps. May it also be said that neither have embraced me.)

As with my career, there are fears to be faced if we are to be forthcoming about where we truly stand. If I tell the charismatic that I have not been blessed with the gift of tongues, depending on the kind of charismatic I’m speaking with, they might make me feel I am either immature in my faith, or even that I have not yet been baptized in the Holy Spirit. If I tell the cessationist that I see no biblical account where the works of the Holy Spirit died with the 12 apostles, I fear being called a heretic. Which do you think I fear more? I am secure enough in my walk and have witnessed the work of the Holy Spirit changing me. Being labeled a heretic by those who think like me is tougher.

Beyond our fears, there are very real consequences to be faced if we fail to give others the ‘answers they are looking for’. If you accuse someone of immorality, very different things will happen than if you challenge the Pharisee.

If you challenge the immoral, they could fall into depression, or even suicide. Or they could take it out on you. You could be charged with violating their human rights. They might rally their likeminded counterparts in an attempt to bring your business to financial ruin. I’m not sure why this happens. I have yet to intentionally rally behind such a cause. My hunch is that they just want to ruin you, but maybe they are thinking it could change your mind. I’m not sure.

If you challenge the Pharisee, you run the risk of being blackballed. You will carry the mark of Cain for the remainder of your days. You will be called ungodly, irreverent, a heretic, hellbound, and unless you repent (and by repent, I do not mean a turning from sin. I mean, you submit to them) your name will be smeared across the internet. And even though our Lord never seemed to sanction widespread public defamation, you will publicly carry the title of a wolf, and imposter.

Which is worse for you? At least if I were to be sued by the immoral person, I’d have the comfort of doing what I thought to be right. Contrasting to the backdrop of the Pharisees, there is something about their ways which have the outward appearance of being the higher ground. A Godly conscience has a more difficult time bearing up under the name of a heretic, than poverty.

I haven’t written you an essay. I am selling you nothing. As usual, I am challenging us to ask a question. Are you looking for truth, or when you open the book or the browser, is there an answer you are looking for?