Meditation and the Search for God

MEDITATION AND THE SEARCH FOR GOD T IKE a neglected attic full of half-forgotten treasures, our L minds are stored with many familiar, but scarcely realized truths. They lie scattered about, a burden on our conscience, whispering reproaches at unexpected moments. They have not been laid aside because we are loathe to admit their uselessness and throw them out, but because we are too preoccupied with the novelties of the moment to pay them any attention. We plan to take a day off sometime and put the storeroom in order. Some things we shall discard; others we shall bring downstairs again and put to active use. Yet for one reason or another we never have a day free, and so the cluttered contents of our minds remain to haunt us. Now and again unexpected circumstances force us to hunt out something we need at the moment; the difficulty of finding it sharpens our resolve-also for the moment. One such truth, too often overlooked in the rush of activity, is the pervading importance of God in human life. The fact of God's existence is the background of western civilization and the heart of the Christian religion. The obligation of men to search for God and the assurance of the possibility of finding Him are the two most impressive realities of human living. Two of the most critical questions a man can ask are, Who made me? Why was I made? The two most significant answers are, God made me-to know and love Him, to serve Him here and to be happy with Him hereafter. These are the only answers that make sense; with them in mind all others sound hollow. Wealth or poverty, fame or obscurity, power or weakness, health or sickness, pleasure or pain, all these become accidental manifestations of the fundamental reality of a human life turned God-wards; they are meaningful only as helps or hindrances in the search for God. 450 MEDITATION AND THE SEARCH FOR GOD 451 If these be the true answers (and we must assume that they are in this paper) we must then admit that the attic or storeroom is no place for them; they are not heirlooms to be displayed only when we expect a visit from our maiden aunt. Without them our house is only a front, less real than a movieset . A polite acceptation of these truths or a reluctant admission of them to our living-rooms is not sufficient; indeed, it is an insult, for such truths as these cannot be merely tolerated; they are imperious, demanding, leaving us little time to pay attention to others. If then we have hidden them in our attic, or grudgingly given them a corner of our living-room, we have as yet not recognized their import. I A man searching for God-what does it mean? Does it make any more sense than the picture of a man looking for the needle in the hay-stack, or that of a child grasping for the mercury from a broken thermometer? God is pure spirit, infinitely transcendent, supernaturally perfect. Can the bungling efforts of a creature ever get on the track of God, much less actually find Him? Where should he look? How can he tell that he is on the right track? How will he know that he has found God? What does it mean to find God? This is the key question; when we know the answer to it, we shall know how to look for God. It is true that God is a perfect being infinitely superior to any of His creatures. He is the only one Who is completely self-sufficient, perfectly happy in the possession of His own goodness; in fact, He can never be unhappy, for He can never lose possession of Himself. If He willed, He could keep that goodness to Himself, or He can give a share of it to others besides Himself; He can even give Himself, His undivided goodness to others. This He has promised to men, that He will give them, not His gifts alone, however great, but Himself. On the assurance of God then we believe that we...