Deep Longing

I was reading in Genesis this evening and came across a verse that immediately brought a painful memory to heart and mind. My father was looking for a church that would welcome him. He had been excommunicated along with others who held to the same belief; i.e. that God would eventually reconcile every thing to Himself by redeeming everyone. I do not know everything that went on – this happened in the late 1950’s and early ‘60’s. I was just a child. But I always followed theological discussions at home and at church with great interest. How I remember the passion with which my father would talk of the Lord’s return at the supper table when we had family devotions.

Even as a ten year old child, to some degree I understood the issue of redemption; the necessity of the atonement and the need to be born again. I think my father understood the implications of the belief of universalism on my future life, and so he would tell us as children that we would have to decide for ourselves once we were mature enough to understand the issues. He had become a moderate universalist.

He had such a heart of compassion and could never reconcile the love of God with the existence of souls in an everlasting lake of fire. While I understand the motivation behind the doctrine, I do not agree with it but that is beside the point.

My father badly wanted a loving church he could call his family; his home. One Sunday he visited another of our denomination’s German churches. He approached the church and started climbing the stairs, and a group of men who recognized him called out and said “Herman, what are you doing here?” (They knew about him and his home church)

Without skipping a beat, he answered, “I am seeking my brothers”.

My father often spoke cryptically. These men did not recognize that he was quoting from Joseph’s response to a stranger who found him wandering the fields (Gen 37:16), looking for the brothers who would betray him and sell him as a slave.  I know little of what happened after that exchange except that the men thought he was kind of weird.

I do know that after a few years, those same churches received the others who had been excommunicated back into fellowship. My Father had moved out of the province in the meantime and to my knowledge was never able to make peace with the church that disfellowshipped him.

"I am seeking my brothers." I often think of that verse when I have a deep longing to connect more deeply with my brothers. Perhaps that longing is something I inherited from my father. Is there such a thing as a spiritual DNA? Deep connections do not come easily but at times when I let my feelings out of their compartment, I long deeply for that.