After a moment of lying there wondering what was happening I fully awoke and realised that she was not going to stop shouting by being ignored so I jumped out of bed and ran into her bedroom to find out what the matter was.
It turned out she'd lost her 'Blanky'. This is her special 'blanket' or 'rag' that she takes everywhere to snuggle and sniff. It started its life as a little hooded cardigan that she wore to sleep in as a baby and now looks nothing like that, but it's very special to her, and is now definitely an important family member!
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| Molly wearing her 'blanky' as a baby. |
After a while of fumbling round and discovering that Blanky was not in any of the usual places, I widened my search to the rest of her bedroom. I couldn't find it anywhere so went back over to her bed, only to discover Blanky was on her bed right under where I'd originally been standing; right under my nose.
I was a bit confused but handed Molly her Blanky to her delight and then left her to go back to sleep while I started thinking about how on earth I hadn't seen it all along. How did I manage to spend so long searching for something that ended up being so close and so obvious?
In the book of Acts, chapter 17, in the New Testament of the Bible there's a story of the Apostle Paul visiting Athens. He noticed that in Athens there were lots of shrines and idols of various 'gods'. Paul had gone there to tell people about Jesus and somehow after a few days managed to get himself an audience of the philosophers, thinkers and important leaders of the city. Here's what he said to them:
"I notice that... one of your altars has this inscription on it: ‘To an Unknown God.’ This God, whom you worship without knowing, is the one I’m telling you about.
24 “He is the God who made the world and everything in it. Since he is Lord of heaven and earth, he doesn’t live in man-made temples, 25 and human hands can’t serve his needs—for he has no needs. He himself gives life and breath to everything, and he satisfies every need. 26 From one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth.
27 “His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us. 28 For in him we live and move and exist. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ 29 And since this is true, we shouldn’t think of God as an idol designed by craftsmen from gold or silver or stone.
30 “God overlooked people’s ignorance about these things in earlier times, but now he commands everyone everywhere to repent of their sins and turn to him. 31 For he has set a day for judging the world with justice by the man he has appointed, and he proved to everyone who this is by raising him from the dead.”
32 When they heard Paul speak about the resurrection of the dead, some laughed in contempt, but others said, “We want to hear more about this later.” 33 That ended Paul’s discussion with them, 34 but some joined him and became believers." (Acts 17:23-34)
The interesting thing is that in verse 27, Paul says that God's purpose is for people to seek after God in order to find him - and that he is not far from any one of us. So God's purpose for you is to look for him and to find him, knowing that he's not far from you. He's closer than you think.
This is good to know but maybe it doesn't always feel like that. I know that when I was searching in the dark for Molly's blanky, that was really close to me but I didn't realise it at the time, so it didn't feel close. There's something about darkness that makes it so much harder to see things for what they really are. I mean if it had been the daytime or if I'd put the light on, I'm sure I would have seen her blanky straight away.
Our world can be a dark place too. You just have to catch up with current news to hear all sorts of sad, horrific and distressing stories of what's going on in the world. Partly, it's this darkness around us that makes it really hard for us to see God or to believe that there is a God. I think that much of the darkness (all the bad stuff) we see and experience in our world is caused by what the Bible calls 'sin' of people. (What is sin? The state of being separated from God and the stuff that separates us from God like selfishness, greed, hatred, unforgiveness.) This is why Jesus came into the world - to die for us and offer us forgiveness of sin and to open a door for us to know God in a personal relationship. He came to bring light so that we can see clearly who God is. Jesus said this:
“I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.” (John 8:12)
In another book of the Bible, Paul wrote this about Jesus:
Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. (Colossians 1:15)
So basically it's like we're in a massive global game of sardines (that game where one person hides and everyone else has to find that person and hide with them - I used to love playing that when I was younger, in fact I still do). But in this game, God is the one hiding and everyone else is looking for him - to hide with him. And it's totally dark. To be fair loads of people have given up and are doing something else or have forgotten about the game completely. But then it's like Jesus has stepped in to the house and by dying on the cross he has switched on the light to reveal that God is right in the middle of the room all along.
If you're searching for God, please look to Jesus. Read more about him in the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke or John in the New Testament of the Bible (check out Biblegateway.com). Remember that God is closer than you think - 'he's not far from any one of us'.
