Buy one… get one free

As I begin this article, it dawns on me that I will end up doing what I’m trying to avoid, that is describing God. Bear with me. This story may help….

A minister of the Eucharist was recently bringing Holy Communion to people who were sick in hospital. She went from ward to ward offering Communion to those who wanted it. As she approached one bed, the elderly lady in it asked her what she was offering.  ‘Holy Communion’, said the Minister, ‘And how much does it cost?’ asked the elderly lady.

This story is one of the saddest I’ve heard for a long time. It is so desperately sad, that a woman who wanted communion, to experience God, would feel that it could come with a financial cost. It’s not hard to understand why she might have thought so. Everything comes with a price these days. And almost everything can be bought.

But God is so beyond our buying, our understanding, our words, our constructs. He is wildly free. At times, I try to shape Him into my daily life. So…..when I feel good, I sense God is close, and when I feel empty, I sense that God is very far away from me. My life seems to throw my perspective of God out of focus. I suppose it’s dawning on me that in some way, my experience and perspective of God has at times been more to do with my experience of myself and others, than of God. We can at times pin our faith in God on people and feelings and ideas, that make us feel that God is closer; an inspiring priest or relationship, a vibrant group, a loving partner, a position in life we enjoy. But none of these are God, and if they go, then we have built our faith on very shaky ground. Feeling that God is close does not mean that He is, no more than feeling that He is far away means that He is either. No-one can sell God to me, I can’t buy Him or know Him on my own terms or describe His presence in my life with words that will ever do Him justice. On the contrary, as John of the Cross says, “When we understand God the least, He is closest to us”.

So how can you or I know God? If I am full of my own story, what I want for my life, then there is no room for God there. If I try to find God in my feelings, then I will find nothing. I will never know God if I think I know Him. The only way to know God is in faith, in hope and in love. To love others is to receive God, to hold faith is to encounter God, to hope is to share in the life of God. I can respond to my life, be it easy or hard, with despair or with hope. Even though you may feel unbearable pain at times, a grinding anxiety or a desperate loneliness, God is the bed rock of your soul. In your worst moments, He is there watching you, knowing you, loving you, wishing you to talk to him. His love is built on freedom: a freedom that traverses all barriers, all costs, all cell walls, all hatred. Even when the way ahead is most unclear, His presence is never closer. It is when you truly hope from the depths, depths that you don’t know will end, that God will support your soul. He won’t forget you. I am starting to realise that God is free, a free gift to me, to you, who has entered the story of our humanity and saved it from within. God has no price, and a value beyond all else.

Ms. Helen Walsh.

26th March, 2006