“Questions God Asks” by Bryan Kevin Dunham

Questions God Asks

Bryan Kevin Dunham                        
Independence Press (2025)
ISBN: 979-8993224503
Reviewed by Paul Knobloch for Reader Views (01/2026)

Bryan Kevin Dunham’s new treatise, Questions God Asks:…And what the answers reveal about us is a deep spiritual examination, not into what we might ask God, but what God might ask us, and why. Dunham’s excellent new book draws our attention to a very important and altogether too rarely treated concept. Is it not possible that God is telling us that we need to ask more questions of ourselves, stop hiding, and clearly name what our problems are, what the truth is, and have the courage to face it?

Dunham starts by reminding us of 622 questions posed by the Big Man throughout the Bible. He includes 620 of them in his appendix, but he focuses closely on ten that receive a thorough examination. I won’t go through every chapter, but some might be interested to know he deals with stories from Genesis, Kings, Jeremiah, Luke, and John.

I’ll take a close look at the “Cain” chapter in Genesis, for it’s a precise example of the author’s approach. Through the use of personal stories, biblical exegesis, psychological and emotional insight, and pastoral applications that teach us how to be shepherded, Dunham shows readers not only how to ask the questions but how to open themselves, spiritually, to finding the answers. It’s through this path of surrender and transformation that the process of self-exploration and God-interrogation reap benefits.

Dunhan starts with a personal story of his father and the abuse suffered at the hands of his grandad, and how it’s helped him understand that his father was “human.” He then quotes the Old Testament: “The LORD said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?’” After this exegesis, we have the psychological reflection:

For all of the patriotic feelings this evokes in me, it also provides an apt metaphor and a personification of what God is warning Cain about in our story. When we experience significant hurt, we look around at the wreckage of our heart in pain and confusion. Many times, we internalize that pain, ruminating on what happened, why it happened, and who did it to us.

We will have nine more chapters like this one, all of which pose serious questions and serve to help make the reader a better critical thinker and self-examiner. Another that impressed me was chapter 5, “Thick as Thieves,” which, of course, addresses the story of Christ overturning the moneylenders’ tables.  In the world we inhabit,  it’s important to remember to hold our institutions to account, and the author has the courage to share that advice with the nation’s churches:

The state of the American Church would indicate we have a tendency to elevate charisma over character and growth in attendance versus growth in godliness. We have built ministries that attract the masses, but struggle to cultivate holiness.

Questions God Asks by Bryan Kevin Dunham reminds us of something vital: God is not our babysitter or bodyguard, but a partner in a path toward spiritual fulfillment. I think that in our isolation, we forget that this is a world of relations and relationships, and that we are not alone but part of something much bigger. To understand this, it’s important not to just ask the right questions, but listen when God asks them.

An important reminder in a very nicely written spiritual work.