One of my hobbies is geocaching. Maybe you have heard of it. It’s a game in which people use GPS’s or other devices to find containers in the oddest of places – in parking lots, in trees, under buildings, and so on. These have been hidden by other players, are often camouflaged, and may contain goodies to trade with other people. The joke is, “I use multimillion dollar military defence satellites to find Tupperware in the woods.”
I am also a member of Barrington Ground Search and Rescue. We meet a couple of times a month to prepare for our primary purpose: lost person searches. It’s a great organization, and we have a lot of fun, but the main reason we exist is to be ready when a person goes missing.
And of course I am a pastor. I am very aware that people are looking for something. They are looking for more fulfillment in their jobs. They’re looking for meaning in the midst of tragedy. They’re looking for love, and as the old country song says, in all the wrong places. My job is to help them find what they are looking for. I believe Jesus is the answer to our saddest hurts, our deepest losses, and our greatest loves.
I take comfort in my belief that no matter big is my search for Jesus, His search for me is even bigger. Long before I cared about Him, He cared about me. Long before I realized that Jesus was what I wanted in my life at the age of 14, in a back corner of a Wesleyan church on Grand Manan Island in New Brunswick, Jesus wanted me. Long before I even told Him I loved Him, He showed me and told me He loved me, in a thousand different ways.
Sure, you can find Bible verses that tell us to search for Him, and that’s true. But His search for me has always been much greater and much costlier than my search for Him. Look at the story of the prodigal son and the forgiving father, as told by Jesus in Luke 15. I can say I have searched for Him, but really, it wasn’t God who was lost and missing. That was me.
His search for me didn’t use a compass or a GPS. The cross and the empty tomb are proof of His love for us, to win us over. He would rather die than live without you or me. Take heart in that while you are in the middle of your own searches.