There is an interesting paradox in the Christian
faith. There is without question an indescribable
joy in finding and discovering God while at the same
time our pursuit of God never ends. How can that be?
I purposely picked the word “pursue” because it’s a
strong verb. No meandering here. We’re not just
strolling or wandering. Pursuing sounds like we’re
almost rushed. One dictionary defined pur-sue like
this, “to chase after someone...intentionally.” I’m
not talking about chasing someone in a creepy,
stalking kind of way. I am talking about
chasing God. And guess what? He likes to be caught!
We want to pursue God because, and only because, He
has first put an urge within us that spurs us to the
pursuit. "No one can come to Me," Jesus said,
"unless the Father who sent Me draws him." In other
words, the impulse to pursue God originates with
God.
Inside the Christmas story, we see this pursuit. It
is a pursuit of a King. Herod was pursuing a King,
but his motives were selfish and evil. That wrong
pursuit led him to carry out atrocities one can
hardly imagine. Counter that with the pursuit of the
Wisemen. Their search brought them to a surprising,
amazing discovery of a child.
Don’t fall trap to one sided pursuits. Don’t let God
do all the pursuing of your heart. The Holy Spirit
is unrelenting, but He can also be ignored. That
neglect can leave you empty; however, pursuing God
openly and genuinely will lead to surprising
discoveries.
A recently retired New York man and his wife decided
to buy a home and a few acres in
Portugal for retirement. They found a perfect and
out of the way farm at a decent price. The modest
farm had been vacant for 15 years; the owner and
wife both had died, and there were no heirs.
The estate was being sold to pay back taxes. There
had been several lookers, but the large barn had
steel doors, and they had been welded shut. No one
wanted to go to the extra expense to see what was in
the barn, and it wasn’t complimentary to the
property anyway... (Basically an eyesore) so, no one
made an offer on the place.
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The New York couple bought it as is, paying about
half the property’s worth; moved in, and set about
to access the barn... curiosity was killing them.
So, they bought a generator and a couple of
grinders...and cut through the welds.
Amazingly, the barn was full of vintage cars...rare
vintage cars like several Aston Martins,
BMW’s,Formula Racers, Austin Healeys, Porsche’s,
Mercedes, Volvo’s, vintage Fords and Chryslers, and
one Yugo. The total value of all the exotic
vehicles... just over 35 million dollars. That had
to be a surprising discovery.
2000 years ago, there was another treasure
discovered in a barn. That treasure was born King of
Kings, and you can discover the thrill of pursuing
Him.
Every journey has a beginning, followed by many
points along the way. Wherever you are on this
adventure with God, do not stop or settle or think
you have "arrived." As the Apostle Paul pointed out,
“I keep pressing on toward the goal.”
[Ron Otto, preaching minister
Lincoln Christian Church]
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