The Why Questions of Life

Why? Such a deep question, or sometimes a thoughtless question. Sometimes it’s a lazy question. Truth is many people have the “why” question itching in their minds for a whole host of scenarios in life. We also find ourselves asking a lot of why questions when we read the Bible – “why is that?”

The big challenge is understanding what our Creator wants us to see. But in reality, it's no different than any other relationship we’ll ever be in. We might say of our spouse or a friend, “Why don’t they get it?” Or “Why do they continue to act that way when they know how it makes me feel?” There are just so many times we don’t really understand why someone acts the way they do… including our own actions!

The story of the Rich man and Lazarus has served as a sneak-peak into an “after death” scene for many people. Not all scholars agree that this is the intention of Jesus in telling this. But if not, then “Why tell it?”

One important step to take in trying to understand a passage of scripture is the context. The context is the setting: geographically, or the prior conversations, things like that. (Go back to Luke 14 for some help). Another important step is having an overall gist of God’s plan or His will. (A great example is found in Matthew 22:37-39.) Some might say, “How can I know the will of God?” Yet, that is in part the purpose of giving us a written word to go back through and discover how God reacted to one human behavior versus another. Romans 15:4, “For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.”

Paul reminds us in Ephesians 5:17, “Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is.” In a sense, the rich man in Luke 16:19-31 was an example of a foolish man. He ignored what apparently was already being revealed to him by Moses and the prophets. Proverbs 10:8, “The wise in heart accept commands, but a chattering fool comes to ruin.”

We’re not told much about the rich man except that he had an opportunity to help someone in need with the wealth he’d been blessed to manage, but he completely ignored that opportunity. Why? Why didn’t he ever feel compassion for the hungry man lying at his gate with boils? Why didn’t he give him anything? How about us? What kind of opportunities are right at our gate that we’ve been blind to?

In this story, the moral was that the scriptures (Moses and the prophets) were revealing God’s will to the rich man so that he could have listened and obeyed and avoided that awful place. He chose to stay ignorant. Perhaps that’s the big lesson that we should take from this passage even more than whether or not this story is a snapshot of the afterlife or not.

“Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest…” (John 4:1-38 – read this passage to get the context) serves as a great reminder of our purpose down here.