Seeking

‘Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born King of the Jews?”’ (Matthew2: 1-2)

I find ‘seeking’ an interesting word and concept. It implies something a bit more than simply ‘looking for’.  It has a sense of a strong desire to find, a determined and deliberate search, a striving for, a pursuit of something.

It seems that this was what the Magi were doing as they travelled from the east (possibly Persia) in search of the new born ‘King of the Jews’.

‘Seeking’ also describes something of an important period of time in my own spiritual journey. As a teenager I had drifted from any real faith and had wandered a bit onto paths that were not likely to lead anywhere terribly good! But through that period of time (possibly a couple of years) I was definitely ‘seeking’ for something... I just was not sure I knew what it was. I tried many of these paths, but not with any sense of finding that which I sought’. ‘I still haven’t found what I’m looking for’ (U2) comes to mind!

But I was certainly determined. I very much wanted to find whatever it was that I sensed I lacked and for which I looked. It was a deep and burning desire within me. I was certainly striving after something.

When I ‘found’ Jesus (or he ‘found’ me) I knew at once that this is what I had been seeking all this time.

But it is that sense of determination, striving and longing that I recall. I wonder where that sense of ‘seeking’ has gone and why it does not now feel so urgent.

Not that I have ‘lost’ Jesus, you understand!

But I am aware too that I am not always fulfilled or living ‘life in all its fulness’, not always experiencing the Spirit’s love, joy and peace etc. So where is the urgent, deliberate and determined ‘seeking’?

Perhaps I am not as wise as I sometimes imagine myself to be!

A few things to ponder in all of this methinks!