Sometimes we complain we cannot find God. Maybe it would be more accurate to state: we are not allowing ourselves to be found by God! Can we allow God the liberty of approaching us in any way that God judges best for us? He may reach out to us tenderly as in Isaiah, "With everlasting love I have mercy

(Pity) on you," (vs 8). God's love surrounds us as a child is in its mother's womb. ("mercy/pity" is drawn from the Hebrew word for "womb").

Or God may burst upon us like those prophets who come into our lives without even a conventional 'how-do-you-do?' Like John the Baptist who cut through rank, privilege and wealth and proposed uncompromisingly to his hearers to accept God on his terms. The latter's unyielding fidelity lands him in prison and earns him the highest tribute paid to a human person by Jesus. 'Of all children born of woman there is no one greater than John' (Lk. 7:28).

To belong to God's Kingdom, however, it is not necessary to have extraordinary credentials or occupy positions of authority in the church; but like the most ordinary of persons be able to acknowledge our need for God. 'For the least in the Kingdom is greater than he is' (vs 28).