A Spiritual Life Questionnaire
Posted by Matt Postiff December 30, 2014 on Matt Postiff's Blog under Apologetics
What do you think about using this set of questions as a "spiritual conversation starter"?
- If you could describe your life in one word, what word would you choose?
- What three things do you most desire out of life?
- Do you foresee any obstacles that might prevent you from obtaining those three things?
- Describe God in a sentence or two.
- How might God affect your efforts to achieve the things you desire in life?
- In your opinion, who is Jesus Christ?
- If you knew that through Jesus Christ God desires to give you the best life possible, would you be interested in finding out more about Him?
I found these amongst the piles of papers I was cleaning out from the 2014 version of my office; evidently I had picked it up somewhere along the way, but I don't remember where.
Theologically, this list of questions is not very good. I don't have a problem with using something of this sort, but these particular questions need a lot of improvement.
In general, the questions place a heavy emphasis on the desires of the person being interviewed. The final question sounds Osteen-ish and is based on wrong theology. The way that a non-Christian hears "best life possible" is "best life right now." But those who live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution (2 Timothy 3:12), so there is no promise of a "best life now" for the new believer. True, in the long run the benefits of the Christian life are way better than the alternative, but that is not what the interviewee is thinking when asked this question.
There are many better surveys than this. One better one would simply be to cut to question 6, but change it to something like this: "What do you know about Jesus?" When they answer, inquire if you could tell them what the Bible says about Him, and see where the conversation goes.
