When I entered college, I was scared to death of calculus. I had never had calculus in high school, and I had always been told how hard it was. It turned out to be easier than my high school math (thank you Mr. Diener), and I did very well; nevertheless, I was very anxious that first semester. One thing that especially perplexed me was that a number of students in the class could get homework problems that I couldn’t, even though I scored much higher on the exams. Once, near the end of the semester, in frustration I asked another student, “How did you figure that out?” He replied, “Well, the answers are in the back of the book.” It had never occurred to me. I immediately realized that it was more important to be able to figure out how to solve a problem than it was to figure out how to get a known answer.

I would later spend 44 years teaching math, and in each class I made sure that most of the problems I assigned were either ones I made up or ones without answers in the back. Of course, if the purpose of the assignment was primarily drill, then I made sure the students had answers to representative problems. Students would often ask if I could give them the answer to a problem, and I would truthfully say, “I don’t know the answer, but I will work it for you.” Some semesters I would have to give my “In Real Life There Is No Answer Book” math sermon. Its point was that in real life you’re working a problem because you don’t know the answer. Confidence in an answer, whether it was produced by you or someone else, only comes from understanding and then trusting the process by which it was obtained.

I’ve also found in my personal life that there is no answer book. Some might say that the Bible is our answer book. Indeed, it is where we should look for guidance, but it doesn’t give specific answers to all the problems we face; it is more like an instruction book. The 613 commandants of the Old Testament, followed by centuries of Rabbinic comment, made an attempt to give an answer to every question, even down to dealing with oxen, but the New Testament, instead of dealing with an encyclopedic list, gave us a process. If we repent and believe, we are given God’s grace, and a part of that grace is the Holy Spirit. We can face our problems with the faith that the Holy Spirit will guide us. As we confront the hard decisions in our lives, we need to look to the Holy Spirit and be thankful that God loves me and YOU unconditionally.

Jim

Originally posted in February 2018