Finding God in the Journey of Theosis

Last week, like many of other students across the country, I packed my bags and left the campus I had called home for the past 10 months. In so doing, I left a community I had come to love and cherish and began my journey towards home. For the next several days, my mom and I traveled across the country, driving from New York to Colorado. At first, the road was familiar and comfortable. Other drivers acted as we expected (as much as New York drivers can), and we made good progress towards our next destination. As we moved further along in our journey however, the drivers and landscape changed. Whatever we were accustomed to in one place felt different in another, and we noticed these changes from place to place. We also encountered several obstacles in our path. There were road closures that forced us to find alternate routes, storms that slowed our progress and almost blew us off the road a couple times, and closed gas stations that caused us to worry a little too much about whether we could make it to the next station. Despite these challenges, we pressed on and several days into our journey, we began to recognize where we were. The road felt familiar, as did the landmarks we passed. Eventually, the streets became so familiar, we didn’t need a GPS to guide us, and, at the end of our journey, we pulled up to our home. While this is a good description of a typical journey home that perhaps you find familiar, when we pause for a second and analyze this story from a spiritual perspective, we can see this as a metaphor for our life in Christ. 

We as humanity began our existence with God in the garden. We knew God and were fulfilling the vocation He had set for us. However, because we sinned by eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we were exiled from Paradise and cast down to earth. But, God did not leave us in exile. He sent His Son to lead everyone, both living and dead, back to Him. Because of God’s grace and mercy, we are all on a journey back towards our Creator. This journey is at times uncomfortable and awkward because we are called to be transformed into God’s image and let go of our fallen image. Christ meets us where we are, as he did the Samaritan woman whom we just read about, and he calls us to a life of transformation, and this transformation is a journey closer to Him.

 We start in a place we know and are familiar with. We are comfortable in our life, but we must all work on becoming closer to Christ. So, we embark on a journey towards him. We pray, go to liturgy, read our Bible, and try to really kindle and deepen our relationship with God. However, this journey will at times be difficult. Something might come up in our life that causes us pain and to question our faith. We fall into old sin that causes us to question whether or not God is truly merciful and feel guilt for our lapse. It would be easy to give up and settle somewhere, but we are all called to press on in our spiritual journey. We aren’t meant to be separate from Him. It would be like if I gave up on my drive and decided that Iowa was close enough to Colorado for me. It clearly is not, but it is a temptation when we’ve been on the road for days and are getting tired. No matter what challenge we face, we must press on. In the Church, we have all the tools we need to overcome whatever obstacle stands between us and the Lord. Eventually, after we understand our journey and where we are in it, we start to see God in everyday occurrences and people. We want to be with Him and know Him more. He becomes the cornerstone of our life.  Eventually, at the end of our life here on earth, we will see Christ face to face, and hopefully, we will know that He is our true home, the home we have been journeying towards this entire time. 

This journey will take a lifetime to complete, unlike my journey from campus to home. It is a journey we are all called to participate in, and at the end, we will be home again with God who has called us out of exile and back to Himself through the crucifixion and resurrection of His Son.