Seek Until We Find

by Celia Hales

When I was in college and taking a Christian ethics course, I was surrounded by agnostics, all except for one devout Roman Catholic who believed because her priest said so. Was I too an agnostic then? I fear so, though there were indications from my childhood that I would find God and live a life that differed radically from my experience in that class.

The professor for this course in Christian ethics never challenged what anybody said in our seminar discussions. He supported the Roman Catholic faith, having found a “home” in it through her church. He was a good listener, encouraging all that we doubters had to say, but not debating anything with us. The final exam had one question, “What have you learned?” I have often wished I had requested that that paper be returned to me after the course was over. I don’t think that now I would believe much of anything I said then.

I made an A. The professor had allowed us to voice our doubts and in so doing I think at least some of us worked through the doubts and realized that there must be something beyond, some Mystery beyond, what we knew when we were 20.

I was fortunate to have that experience. But I do really wonder if our churches today allow their congregations to work through their doubts.

As a personal example, I want to tell you about a male cousin of mine. For all of his adult life, he belonged to the Ayden Free Will Baptist Church. The Ayden church has been known as a leader in the Original Free Will Baptist Church for years and years. My cousin heard some of the best preaching out there. He attended faithfully: Sunday school, Sunday morning church service, Sunday evening church service, and Wednesday night prayer meeting. And he tithed to both the church and Mount Olive College (now University). For a while in my late twenties, I lived with my grandparents and worked at the Free Will Baptist Press Foundation; this cousin and his wife visited us frequently. I went to a prayer meeting with him, and I remember that when the minister asked if anybody had a request for prayer, I watched as my cousin bowed his head and raised his right hand. Many other people there raised their hands as well.

I would learn much later what sadness enveloped my cousin when he raised his hand asking for prayer. When he was in his final illness, he confided in his wife that he did not know if he was saved. I do not know what she said in reply, but I do know that she kept this admission in her heart until after he died. Then she told my grandmother—her dear friend and kin by marriage—and much later did my grandmother tell me. None of us suspected through the 93 years of his long life.

What burdens did the rest of the congregation who raised their hands for prayer carry within their hearts? Did they hold these secrets within, telling nobody, like my cousin?

There is help for the burdens that we carry within. We don’t have to tell anybody, but we know that we did not create ourselves, and so there is a Mystery in the cosmos, called God, who knows the secrets of our hearts, for this Mystery created us. No agnostic has an answer to how we got here if not by some Higher Power.

We do not have to walk this journey alone. Voicing doubts is not an evil thing; it is natural to us as humans who don’t know it all.

My journey, after that Christian ethics course, was to seek and seek and seek, reading far and wide until I developed an intellectual, as well as an emotional, belief in God. God gave us minds for a reason, and suppressing our questions and suppressing our doubts will not get us anywhere in the long run.

We need to realize that our hearts can speak to us when our minds fail. Our hearts don’t need “proof” of God. When we love others, we have touched glory. Our hearts will often then validate the truth of God’s existence and His love for us.

Seek and seek and seek, until we find. Then know that our journey has done what it was intended to do: cement our relationship with love. And with love, we will know what God, who in quietness warms our hearts, wants us to know.