Two Roads…Pick One | Holy Trinity Church Webster, NY

(Give this to a 20/30 Something)

Two roads lie ahead of us. One directs our lives to a God who we cannot see. The other road is in search of some hope for happiness here on earth before the lights go out.

The God Factor is critical in how you experience life. Things go off in two very different directions depending on what you believe about God and whether this God has a purpose for your life. See what you think. . . . .

Here’s what happens if there is no God
(or if God is totally unconcerned about humans walking the earth.)

Nothing means anything. “Good” or “bad” is merely your opinion. What you think is “your truth”. What I think is “my truth”. In fact there is no ultimate truth.
Since there is no ultimate goodness to guide our actions then “lesser goods” will serve. Money, possessions, leisure and pleasure are what life is about.
Might makes right. I can do it (whatever) because I can.
Sickness, poverty, or tragic happenings can only be seen as absurd or real bad luck. Flee these things. Pity those who encounter them. They are the “unlucky ones”.
Any moment of beauty or longing that our lives have ultimate meaning is an illusion and should be tolerated like Santa Claus with our children. (Let this God myth continue as long as it keeps people happy).
An “eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” is the best way of dealing with human conflict. But who has the authority to declare something as righteous or criminal?
Our best hopes for our children would be that they were skillful hunters in getting what they want in a world that doesn’t care.
About the best thing we can wish anybody is “Good Luck”.

Pretty grim, wouldn’t you say? Yet that is the way of the human heart without God. You see, we humans were MADE FOR God. Made to enter into relationship with Him and without Him . . . . we lose our purpose for existing. We become, as the great theologian Romano Guardini put it, “clever animals”.

The revealed God of Christianity changes everything.

Here’s what happens when you let God into your life. (These contrast with 1-8).

Everything means something. The fact that something “exists” gives it purpose in the plan of God. All that has being shares to some degree in the truth of its maker.
The “lesser goods” become what they were intended to be–joys in life that point to a loving God who wishes our happiness. They are not an end in themselves.
By God’s love (revealed in Christ), we become brothers and sisters to each other, NOT “threats” or rivals.
The hard things in life (sickness, etc.) have been redeemed. They too now serve God’s purpose. They reveal true love. (We only know this by Jesus Christ who took suffering and death to himself to reveal what God’s love is like.) “Love bears all things.” 1 Cor.13.
Longing for peace or purpose in life is a grace put there by God to remind us of our true home. “Our hearts are restless until they rest in thee, Oh Lord.” St. Augustine.
With God there’s this thing called Mercy. This means love goes beyond justice (eye for eye) to a “kindness far beyond what is deserved.”
Our best hope for our children is that they would grow to be good and kind and happy in “doing what is right and just”. And that they would come to know the plan of love God has given them to follow.
Our best wish for someone? “Go with God”.

Go with God.
Fr. Tim