Cybercolumn for 4/19 by Berry D. Simpson: The right guy_41904

Posted: 4/16/04

CYBERCOLUMN:
The right guy

By Berry D. Simpson

At lunch, during a conversation about career choices and ministries and teaching the Bible and leading discussion groups and spiritual theories and what comes next in our lives, Art asked: “You once said that you’re always one book away from having all the answers. Have you found that book yet? Have you figured out the answers?”

I said: “No, but it doesn’t bother me as much as it used to. I’ve decided that searching for answers is more important than the answers themselves.”

It occurred to me that for most of my adult life, at least my disciple years, which includes college, I was driven to find all the right answers. I thought that was my job. I read books and studied the Bible and went to seminars and learned all I could so I could be a better teacher and help people. Having something to share was my prime motivation, and I worked hard to keep my supply of facts and principles well-stocked.

After we finished lunch, I walked across the street toward my office and thought about our conversation. It occurred to me, in the middle of the street, that through the years my motivation had changed. I wasn’t trying so hard anymore to learn all the right answers. Nowadays, my motivation was to be the right guy. I still read books and study the Bible and go to seminars and learn all I can, but I do it so that I can be a better, more godly, man. Right answers versus right guy.

At first, I wasn’t sure the change was good, since it sounded so selfish. Where I used to be motivated to help other people, now I just wanted to work on my own heart. Was I moving in the right direction?

And then, of all places, as I walked up the stairs to my floor, it was as if I got a fresh gift of grace from God. He said to me: “Don’t worry about this so much. You are a more effective teacher nowadays than you were back then—you are affecting more people in a deeper way.” Well, I was stopped breathless, and not from the stair climb, but because this was a big insight for someone like me.

I thought, this explains why I am more content with not knowing the full path of my life. I used to worry about that, but in fact, it now scares me to know too much. I’m afraid if I know too many answers I’ll decide I can handle my life without God’s help. I need the uncertainty and tensions of trying to figure out my path and purpose. It’s what gives me the energy to keep seeking after God. The search is more important than the answers. Answers may satisfy my mind, but the search molds my heart.

I thought about all those Bible verses I memorized when I was in college—we were coached to memorize verses so we could answer questions and counsel people and be better ministers, always ready to whip out a verse on the quick draw. But not once in the past 25 years have I had the opportunity to rattle off a Bible verse to answer someone’s question or meet an intellectual objection. No, as it turned out, the strength of all my memorization was not in teaching other people the answers, but in changing my heart. I may have learned and reviewed verses to know more facts, but the process of learning changed who I was. It changed my character. And so, all those years of self-discipline were less about finding the right answers and more about becoming the right guy. Who knew?

And I realized why it’s been so hard for me to explain what I learned from a Promise Keepers rally or from the Wild at Heart Boot Camp, or even from a solitary backpacking weekend in the Guadalupes. So many times I’ve come back telling everyone what a great time I had and how God spoke to me, yet unable to articulate exactly what God said or what I learned. I remember looking back through pages of seminar notes so I would have an answer, but it seldom helped. I often wondered if I was wasting time seeking God if I couldn’t state clearly what I found.

However, there in the stairwell of my office building, it all started coming together in my mind. I had pursued spiritual experiences, read books, studied and taught the Bible, not to find answers, but to let those experiences change me and mold me. It was about my heart, not about facts.

Well, I must say, the search isn’t over. I’m still looking for that one book that will finally explain it all and solve all my questions, but when I find it, I doubt I’ll be able to say much about it. However, I will be a changed man.

Berry Simpson, a Sunday school teacher at First Baptist Church in Midland, is a petroleum engineer, writer, runner and member of the city council in Midland.