How to Avoid the Unhelpful Question

There are questions worth asking in life. Did I put deodorant on? Did I forget to pay my credit card bill? Should I eat the re-fried beans considering I’m on a date? These are helpful questions.

Then, there are unhelpful questions, the king of which, in my opinion, is “Am I spiritual enough?” 

Photo courtesy of Raymond Bryson via flickr.com

Nothing sucks me into a vortex quicker than The Unhelpful Question. High winds and negative pressure suck every insecurity into it’s path. It pulls up contentment by the roots. It splatters guilt everywhere. And, it keeps me spinning so fast, that I start to lose grip on reality. 

I should know better, but last week I stepped into the vortex. A friend has taken a couple months off work to write a Bible study. A classmate runs a women’s ministry at her church. A friend volunteers her time with refugees. I’m not doing any of those things. Am I spiritual enough? 

I felt sure I could only please God if I wrote a Bible study, led a woman’s ministry, and started meeting with refugees. I suffered from temporary amnesia, forgetting that God has already called me to other things right now—providing compassionate medical care and finishing this seminary degree. As the vortex kept spinning, I worried that those things weren’t enough.

Part of the allure of The Unhelpful Question is that asking if I’m spiritual enough sounds…well, spiritual. The Bible does talk about spirituality, after all, especially in 1 Corinthians. 

Spirituality was a hot topic for the Corinthians. In Paul’s first letter to them, he uses the word “spiritual” (pneumatikos) fourteen times (three times more than all his other letters combined*). But, when Paul talks about spirituality, he’s not offering them a measuring stick, he’s contrasting it with a way of living that neglects God. Spirituality, according to Paul, is about having “the mind of Christ” (1 Cor 2:16), seeing life through his eyes—the people at work, the project at home, the loud neighbors.

By contrast, scrounging around for evidence of our spirituality and comparing our pile with someone else’s, is a very unspiritual thing to do. And, this is exactly what the Corinthians were doing. According to Paul, it was proof of their unspirituality (1 Cor 3:1-3; 8:1-3). 

So, instead of ending up like the Corinthians, let’s find more helpful questions to ask, ones that won’t sweep us into the vortex. The Bible is full of concrete guidelines to draw from. For example: 

• Was I thankful today, or did I rob God with my complaining? 
• Have I honored God today, or was I focused on serving myself? 
• Did I live by grace today, or did I slip back into thinking that I can earn (or lose) God’s favor? 

These questions are helpful. If we’ve been ungrateful, we can confess it and move on. This pleases God. Or perhaps, as we eat a slice of apple pie (which I’m doing as I write), these types of questions can remind us to thank God for the wonders of cooking. This pleases him, too. 

After all, what are we aiming for—to be more spiritual than the Joneses or to please God? Take it from someone who frequents the vortex all too often. Get rid of The Unhelpful Question. It deserves a place on the Do Not Ask list, right before “Do I look fat in this dress?” 

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* Letters where Paul’s authorship is undisputed. [Gerald F. Hawthorne, Ralph P. Martin, and Daniel G. Reid, eds., Dictionary of Paul and His Letters (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993), 174.]