Dan WillisChief Inspiration Officer (CIO), Speak Out Media · Starting into the next chapter!

What would it change to stop asking "why God" and start asking "what #God". #christian #christianity

30 Jun 2026 · 2 min

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1:42

In this reflective vlog, the speaker shares a key insight from a Max Lucado book: instead of asking "Why God?" when facing hardship, we should ask "What God?"—that is, what lesson or purpose God may be communicating through the trial. The speaker illustrates this shift using the biblical story of Joseph, highlighting how Joseph’s various trials (imprisonment, service to Potiphar, interpreting dreams, and influencing Pharaoh) can be seen as opportunities to learn patience, fulfill tasks, and serve a larger purpose. By adopting the "what God?" mindset, the speaker suggests viewers can reframe their own difficulties to focus on learning, purpose, and action rather than merely questioning the cause. The video concludes by inviting the audience to consider how this change in questioning would affect their lives.

Chapters

All right, end of the day. Just finished reading the last of the Max Lucado book, and one of the questions that just stuck out in such a huge way reading through it was we often ask the question, why God? And he suggests that maybe it would be better than asking why God to ask what God. So not necessarily Why is this happening? Why am I here? What's— why is the— why is the sky falling? But instead to ask the question, what are you trying to teach me? And he uses Joseph as an ongoing example throughout the book, but really leans into this of through each calamity that Joseph faces, not asking the question, why is this happening? But Joseph trusting that God has a plan and a purpose in it and asking the question of, what is the purpose of this? What is the purpose? What am I supposed to learn? What am I supposed to be experiencing? What am I supposed to be doing here? And sometimes it, it can be a lesson you're supposed to be learning. Sometimes it can be the patience that he was learning while he was in prison. Sometimes there could be a task that he's supposed to fulfill. So the hard work he was doing with Potiphar or, or Or helping people break down the dreams, the 2 soulmates that were with him, and then eventually Pharaoh. But that constant question of what God during times of trial instead of why God, it's just kind of a big deal. What would that look like for you guys? What would that change to ask what God instead of why?