{"id":3217,"date":"2019-06-09T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-09T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/?p=3217"},"modified":"2019-06-08T19:31:19","modified_gmt":"2019-06-08T23:31:19","slug":"god-will-find-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/god-will-find-you\/","title":{"rendered":"God Will Find You!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"custom-html-block\"><iframe title=\"God Will Find You! 6\/9\/19\" src=\"https:\/\/www.podbean.com\/media\/player\/v7j42-b3df66?from=yiiadmin&amp;download=1&amp;version=1\" data-link=\"https:\/\/www.podbean.com\/media\/player\/v7j42-b3df66?from=yiiadmin&amp;download=1&amp;version=1\" height=\"122\" width=\"100%\" style=\"border: none;\" scrolling=\"no\" data-name=\"pb-iframe-player\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\"><strong><u>Today is the Feast of Pentecost<\/u>. <u>It is often called the birthday of the Church<\/u>.<\/strong> That is a good description of today\u2019s feast, but in a true sense, it isn\u2019t the birthday of the Church. Why not? <em><u>Because when we say the birthday of the Church, we unconsciously think of the Church as we know it today<\/u>.<\/em> <\/p>\n<p><u>But when the day of Pentecost happened and the Church was born, there was no Church as we know it today<\/u>. There was a fisherman named Peter who often blundered. The apostle Paul sometimes had to correct him. <\/p>\n<p><em><u>There were no church buildings or cathedrals<\/u>. They would come 300 years later. <u>There was no St. Peter\u2019s Square,<\/u> not until the 4th century. <u>There were no cardinals<\/u>. They were created in the 11th century. <u>There was no canon law<\/u> until the 12th century. <br \/><\/em><br \/><strong><em>The organizational growth that came centuries after Pentecost had the unfortunate effect of making people identify the Church with the <u>real estate<\/u>, the <u>bureaucracy<\/u>, the <u>rules<\/u>, the <u>laws<\/u> and the <u>titles<\/u>, instead of with <u>its people<\/u>. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em><u>We have to remember that the Holy Spirit came upon the people<\/u>, <u>ordinary people<\/u>, <u>like you and me that 1st Pentecost<\/u>. They were filled with the power of the Holy Spirit and the Church was born.<\/em> <\/p>\n<p>The late Fr. John Powell, S.J., tells the story of how the Holy Spirit found him and one of his students and so deeply touched both of their lives. <\/p>\n<p><strong>The college student was named Tommy and one day he showed up for his Theology of Faith class that Powell was teaching. <\/strong>Tommy had hair down to his shoulders and wound up being the <em>\u201catheist in residence\u201d i<\/em>n the class. Tommy was always objecting and smirking at a God who loved us unconditionally. In class he went out of his way to be a pain in the neck. <\/p>\n<p>On the last day of class, Tommy tossed the final exam on Fr. Powell\u2019s desk and said with a cynical tone of voice: <strong><em>\u201cDo you think I\u2019ll ever find God?\u201d <br \/><\/em><\/strong><br \/>Fr. Powell retorted with a little shock therapy and said, <strong><em>\u201cNo, I don\u2019t think you\u2019ll ever find God, but I\u2019m absolutely certain that God will find you.\u201d <\/em><\/strong>Tommy shrugged and left. <\/p>\n<p><u>A couple of years later there was the sad report that Tommy had terminal cancer<\/u>. One day he came to see Fr. Powell. His body was wasted. All of his hair had fallen out due to chemotherapy. They sat down and talked. <\/p>\n<p>Powell asked him what it was like to be only 24 years old and to be dying? <strong><em>\u201cWell it could be worse,\u201d<\/em><\/strong> he said. <strong><em>\u201cHow could it be worse?\u201d<\/em><\/strong> Fr. Powell asked. <\/p>\n<p><em>\u201c<u>Well, I could be 50 and have no values or ideals<\/u>. <u>I could be 50 and think that booze and seducing women and making money were the biggies in life<\/u>.\u201d<\/em> Fr. Powell sat there dumbfounded. <\/p>\n<p>Tommy continued, <em>\u201c<u>I remember asking you if I would ever find God and you said NO<\/u>. <u>But God would find me<\/u>. I\u2019ve thought about that a lot. When the doctor removed the lump from my groin and said that it was malignant and had spread everywhere, I got serious about finding God.<br \/><\/em><br \/><em>\u201c<u>I began banging my bloody fists against the bronze doors of heaven<\/u>. But God did not come out. In fact, nothing happened. So I quit trying. I decided I really didn\u2019t care about God or the afterlife. I decided to spend what time I had left doing something more worthwhile. <\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201c<em><u>I remembered you talking about our greatest sadness is going through life without loving<\/u><\/em>.<\/strong><em> So I started with the hardest one of all \u2013 my father. When I approached him he really didn\u2019t want to talk. But I said to him,<strong> \u2018Dad, I love you. I just wanted you to know that.\u2019 <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><\/em><em>\u201c<u>He began to cry and he hugged me<\/u>. <u>He had never done that before<\/u>. <u>We talked all night<\/u>, <u>even though he had to go to work the next morning<\/u>. <u>It felt so good to hear him say he loved me<\/u>.<\/p>\n<p><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201c<u>It was easier with my mother and my little brother<\/u>. <u>We shared things we had kept secret for so many years.<\/u> <u>Here I was in the shadow of death and I was just beginning to open up to the people I was the closest to<\/u>. <\/p>\n<p><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>\u201cThen one day I turned around and God was there. He didn\u2019t come to me when I pleaded with him. I guess I was like the animal trainer saying, \u2018Come on, jump!\u2019 But God doesn\u2019t do things that way. <u>God found me even after I stopped looking for him.<\/u>\u201d <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>\u201cTommy,\u201d Fr. Powell exclaimed, <em>\u201cYou are saying what we all eventually wind up saying: \u2018<strong>The surest way to NOT find God is to make God our private possession, our problem-solver, our instant consolation in time of need.\u2019 <u>But by opening ourselves up to God\u2019s love<\/u>, <u>God will always find us<\/u>!\u201d<br \/><\/strong><\/em><br \/>So here we are on Pentecost Sunday!! It\u2019s not Christmas or Easter. It\u2019s Pentecost, the birthday of us Christians who make up the Church. <strong><em><u>So what do you believe<\/u>? <br \/><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><u>Do you believe things happen in your life purely by accident<\/u>? <u>Or do things happen in your life for a reason<\/u>?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><u>What are some of the relationships that have gone well for you and are life-giving<\/u>? <u>How about those relationships that have gone badly and sometimes feel like hell<\/u>? <u>Is there a reason why you were in those relationships<\/u>? <\/p>\n<p><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><u>Some of your hopes and dreams have been realized<\/u>, <u>some are broken or shattered<\/u>. <u>Was there a reason behind those hopes and dreams<\/u>? <\/p>\n<p><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><u>We all go through illness and the death of loved ones<\/u>. <u>Do illness and death just happen to you in life<\/u>? <u>Or is there a Power and a Fire behind illness and death<\/u>? <u>What do YOU believe<\/u>?<\/p>\n<p><\/strong><strong><em>On this Pentecost, I believe that the Holy Spirit is a whole lot busier in my life than I could ever imagine!!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Today is the Feast of Pentecost. It is often called the birthday of the Church. That is a good description of today\u2019s feast, but in a true sense, it isn\u2019t the birthday of the Church. Why not? Because when we say the birthday of the Church, we unconsciously think of the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3216,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"qubely_global_settings":"","qubely_interactions":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"qubely_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"medium":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-m":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-ml":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"ocean-thumb-l":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_portrait":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",150,150,false],"qubely_thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured.png",100,100,false],"rpwe-thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/1560036234_featured-45x45.png",45,45,true]},"qubely_author":{"display_name":"Medard Laz","author_link":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/author\/medlaz\/"},"qubely_comment":0,"qubely_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/category\/weekly-messages\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Weekly Messages<\/a>","qubely_excerpt":"&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; Today is the Feast of Pentecost. It is often called the birthday of the Church. That is a good description of today\u2019s feast, but in a true sense, it isn\u2019t the birthday of the Church. Why not? Because when we say the birthday of the Church, we unconsciously think of the&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3217"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}