Better Questions

Sometimes the difference between shallow discipleship and deeper formation begins with a question. Not a new program. Not another curriculum. A question.

Consider the difference

From participation questions to formation questions

Participation question

Formation question

Did you attend the Bible study?

What did Scripture expose or change in you?

Did you join a small group?

Who knows what you are actually struggling with?

Did you serve this month?

What did serving reveal about your motives, patience, or love?

Did you complete the prayer course?

What has changed in the way you pray?

Did you attend the marriage event?

What are you doing differently with your spouse because of what you learned?

The first set tells us whether someone entered the environment. The second begins to reveal what happened there.

Ask for evidence, not labels

Do not ask ~~Are you mature?~~
Ask Can you describe a recent situation where you responded differently than you would have a year ago?
Do not ask ~~Are you more generous?~~
Ask Where has generosity changed an actual decision?
Do not ask ~~Are you closer to God?~~
Ask What has changed in your prayer, trust, attentiveness, or dependence on God?

Three ordinary moments

The question after

After the sermon

Instead of: What did you think of the message?

What are you going to do because of what you heard?
Where did the message confront something in your life?
What do you need to obey before this becomes another sermon you remember but never respond to?

After Scripture

Instead of: What did you read?

What did you notice?
What did it reveal about God, about you, or about the way you are living?
What will you do with what you saw?

After prayer

Instead of: Did you pray today?

What are you bringing before God repeatedly?
What are you asking God to change in you, not merely around you?
What prayer has not been answered, and what is the waiting forming in you?

If there is one question worth repeating throughout a church

What are you obeying?

Not: What do you agree with? Not: What did you learn? Not: What inspired you?

Going deeper

Six more places to ask

Resistance

What do you already know that you are not doing?
Where are you delaying?
Where are you waiting for more clarity even though you already know enough to act?

Patterns

What keeps repeating?
The same conflict? The same fear? The same temptation? The same Scripture?

Change over time

What is different from a year ago?
What used to control you that controls you less now?
What do people closest to you say has changed?

Relationships

Whom do you need to forgive?
Who can tell you the truth?
How are the people closest to you experiencing your growth?

Discernment

What do you think God may be drawing your attention to?
What Scripture bears on it?
Are you willing to wait? Are you willing to be wrong?

Mission

Who are you helping grow?
Where is compassion costing you something?
Who is closer to Jesus because you are following Jesus?

Use with care

Invite, don't interrogate

The goal is not interrogation. It is invitation. A good question opens space. It does not force disclosure. It respects privacy. It allows someone to say, “I am not ready to talk about that.”

The quality of the question matters. The quality of the relationship matters more.

Make room for answers like:

“I do not know.”
“I am still struggling.”
“I think God may be showing me something, but I am still testing it.”
“I obeyed in one area and resisted in another.”
“I have made progress, but I am not free yet.”

Ask again.

We know what the program did.: What happened in you?
We know you attended.: What changed?
We know you learned.: What did you obey?
We know you served.: What was formed?
We know you were baptized.: What happened next?