Deepest Division
The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following and he said to them, ‘What are you seeking?’ (John 1)
Peter Kreeft makes a startling observation in our supposedly post-belief world:
For us, the clearest division seems to be the visible one between atheists and theists, unbelievers and believers, between those who have found God and those who have not.
For God, the deepest division is the invisible one between seekers and non-seekers. For seeking is done with the heart, and God alone knows the secrets of every heart (Food for the Soul, 144).
Western nations report rising agnosticism and atheism, but there is a great silence about the act of seeking.
Why?
Jesus himself respects and loves those who are seekers and searchers, precisely because it is wisdom:
Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened (Matthew 7).
Kreeft again:
All who truly seek the true God, the God not of power but goodness and love, will find him – if not in this life, then in the next.
Amen.
I love the image off being a ‘seeker’.
In many ways I see the purpose of the church as helping seekers to find God. Of course people also look elsewhere in their seeking of God, and as we know, God/Jesus is present in so many different places and people and ways of being in our wonderful world.
It is sad when seekers find the church not a welcoming place for their search, when they are expected to conform to a particular stereotype of being a ‘believer’.
My hope is that we in the church will always welcome seekers and give them the space and time to find their own experience of God in our midst.