Fr Mark Schultz

Dear Friend,

It is probably not too much of a generalization to claim that we are all seekers in one way or another. We’re seeking the profound Sabbath of deep communion with God; we’re seeking the Pattern of the Holy City in the midst of the various earthly cities and communities in which we sojourn; we’re seeking the Image of Christ in our neighbor; we’re seeking the Splendor of the Eternal Brightness shining in and from the little details of our everyday lives. Augustine said it best when he wrote in the Confessions that we are restless ‘til we find our rest in God.

Sometimes, though, in the midst of our seeking, something a bit strange happens. Either because we’re too anxious to get where we imagine we’d like to be, or because the journey itself is often so pleasant and filled with spiritual wonders (or for any number of reasons, really), we can gradually come to think that the journey is its own end...like someone on a boat travelling to a distant land who comes to believe that the boat is their destination. Gradually we find ourselves settling for lesser lights instead of the Splendor; for our own image rather than that of Jesus; for an ordering ideology rather than the Pattern; for complacency rather than Sabbath.

And I have to say, I write this not from any great height of spiritual accomplishment but as someone who often finds himself stuck: in the midst of our seeking, we can find ourselves unwilling to be found.

That’s the brilliant and salutary thing about our reading from Isaiah this morning: even as we are seeking, says the prophet, God has already found us and is longing for us, aching for us to realize that there is no distance between us and God that God has not already crossed in God’s love for us. There is no aspect of our lives, however dire or dark, that does not admit some supernal sliver of light from the Divine Glory. There is no relationship of love in which the Pattern is absent, no person in whom the Royal Image does not gleam, no rest that does not open out into Sabbath. Very often, the real point of our seeking is that it’s the only way we can realize that God was with us from the beginning, longing for us to open our eyes and see the Presence there before us, behind us, above us, below us, holding and embracing us, longing for us to know: we’re found. God says through the prophet: “I said, ‘Here I am, here I am,’ to a nation that did not call on my name. I held out my hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in a way that is not good, following their own devices” (Is.65:1b-2). Which is to say: “I’ve found you! Will you not let me find you? Will you not stop for a moment to realize that I hold you even now? Will you not relax into the arms of the Sabbath that embraces you, that is here now and was here even before you arrived or knew to seek for it?"

Because the reality is: to find what we’re searching for, it’s important that we consent to be found.

Under the Mercy,
Fr Mark+