On Finding God

One does not ‘find’ God.

It’s a preposterous notion, quite frankly. To assume that the Lord is somehow missing, that a large amount of labor and luck is required in discovering His whereabouts. God is not a lost child, nor is He a missing person. He has not hidden Himself away in some far off place from us, watching with mild disinterest as we call out the search teams to light the way towards His possible midnight recovery, sighing and lighting a cigarette as we desperately call out His name.

It is not our place to ‘find’ the Lord.

It is, however, our place to come to Him.

God is there, He is everywhere, and He is waiting for us. Julian of Norwich writes,

“We are His crown, the crown which is the Father’s joy, the Son’s honour, the Holy Spirit’s pleasure, the endless, blessed wonder of all heaven.”

Now, who among men and higher beings would forsake such gems? I don’t mean to inflate your ego here, for we are little more than animals. We are crude, rude, and violent beasts, prone to war and unspeakable acts along with petty backstabbing and fits when life—which moves at its own pace, mind you—does not bend to our will. We have a taste for brutish pleasure that satiates purely the body’s carnal desires. We are hesitant to drop our dirty doings and leave for the house of God, often unwilling to abandon the ways we are so used to, which are the same ways that are slowly bringing about our ruin. It is a disgusting, albeit unfortunately fitting description, and I desperately hope that I have caused you to feel uncomfortable, perhaps even ashamed. And I hope this for several reasons. In The Cloud of Unknowing, it states,

“Perfect correspondence to His grace consists in a strong, deep, interior sorrow…The sorrow I speak of is genuine and perfect, and blessed is the man who experiences it…This sorrow purifies a man of sin and sin’s punishment. Even more, it prepares his heart to receive that joy through which he will finally transcend the knowing and feeling of his being.”

But how is knowledge of who you are and what you are, and the corresponding sorrow and shame, vital to coming to God? It is vital because we must move past ourselves. I return to my original analogy. It is not God who is lost; it is us. Until we recognize ourselves for the faulty creatures we are, we cannot make our way forward. We will only stagger, drunk on our imaginary achievements and pleasure seeking, before falling flat. We must recognize our problems, and then make our way home, even if we stagger, back to where the Lord is waiting with anxious, ancient worry. And, believe me, He is waiting. We are the crown of the Lord because He has made us and given us the capacity to love so deeply and achieve so much when we truly wish to be influenced by Him. What has been made by the Lord is beautiful, but we must first reconcile our freedom with our responsibility. Once we wake up from our sins, recognize our addiction to treachery, and work through our withdrawal from evil and temptation, the Lord will welcome us back with wide arms and a feast at His table. There will be rejoicing in the house of God, for we who were lost have returned.

So therefore it is clear that it is not our duty to ‘find’ God.

It is our duty to first find ourselves, and then make our way to our union with the Lord. He is waiting, deeply in love with us, and moved by our trials. God is God, and we are Man, and we must come to Him.

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“…God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.” ~Mother Theresa

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For Further Reading:

1) The Cloud of Unknowing
2) Revelations of Divine Love (Chapter LI [51]) by Mother Julian of Norwich

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Comments, questions, and discussions are appreciated and encouraged. Peace!