The Great Adventure of Discovery
“To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek Him, the greatest adventure; to find Him, the greatest human achievement.”
This beautiful line from St. Augustine spells out for us the purpose for our lives here on Earth. Are we lonely and feeling unloved? Here is our true love! Are we lost and wandering? Here is our noble adventure! Are we searching for purpose? Here is our great achievement!
The greatest romance. What does it mean for us to fall in love with God? What does this look like? To fall in love with Christ is to know Him, to spend time with Him, and to bring others to Him. Just as with our relationships with family and friends, we desire to spend time with those whom we love. The same is true in our relationship with God! Surely, we have all come to know God in one way or another; whether through the teachings of our parents, the encouragement of our friends, or through our own searching and inquisitiveness. No matter how we fell in love with God, it inevitably becomes clear to us that in our pursuit of Him, He was pursuing us. What is the sign of this great romance? The sign of this romance is the Cross. No greater love story can ever be written than the love story of the Cross. He died for us, so that we may join Him in Paradise. We rejected Him with our sins, and yet, instead of turning His back on us, He opens wide His arms and mounts the Throne of Redemption for our sake!
The greatest adventure. Yearning. Longing. Restlessness. These are all things that we experience in our day-to-day lives. How can we not feel these things! We are not made for this earthly life; but are strangers and sojourners. We are always longing for this adventure, to find the place, as C.S. Lewis says, where all the beauty came from. This pursuit of holiness, with its high peaks, and – at times – deep valleys, is the greatest adventure we could possibly hope to find ourselves in. What a gift it is to find and walk this path!
The greatest human achievement. How do we measure our success? Is it in our work? Our talents? Our number of friends? Good as these are, they are not our true measure of success. To live a truly successful life of faith, we must find Him; we must search the field and find the Pearl of great price. And when we have finally found Him, we must have the courage to echo the words of St. Peter, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” To continuously fall in love with, seek, and find Jesus Christ is our mission. This is the path of lifelong discipleship; this is what we hope to offer in our Discovering Christ series starting on September 24th. Beginning the path of discovery can be daunting, but once started you ‘will find wonder after wonder and all of them true.’ May it be our goal and prayer to continually search after Christ, and once our great adventure comes to an end, we may come face-to-face with God, and hear Him say, “Well done, my good and faithful servants.”
Grant O’Neil, Director of Lifelong Discipleship & Outreach