{"id":8923,"date":"2021-02-22T22:55:19","date_gmt":"2021-02-23T02:55:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/?p=8923"},"modified":"2021-02-22T22:55:48","modified_gmt":"2021-02-23T02:55:48","slug":"god-longs-to-bring-me-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/?p=8923","title":{"rendered":"God Longs to Bring Me Home"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Nouwen-2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Nouwen-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-8924\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Nouwen-2.jpg 800w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Nouwen-2-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Nouwen-2-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>For most of my life I have struggled to find God, to know God, to love God.  I have tried hard to follow the guidelines of the spiritual life &#8212; pray always, work for others, read the Scriptures &#8212; and to avoid the many temptations to dissipate myself.  I have failed many times but always tried again, even when I was close to despair.<\/p>\n<p>Now I wonder whether I have sufficiently realized that during all this time God has been trying to find me, to know me, and to love me.  The question is not &#8220;How am I to find God?&#8221; but &#8220;How am I to let myself be found by him?&#8221;  The question is not &#8220;How am I to know God?&#8221; but &#8220;How am I to let myself be known by God?&#8221;  And, finally, the question is not &#8220;How am I to love God?&#8221; but &#8220;How am I to let myself be loved by God?&#8221;  God is looking into the distance for me, trying to find me, and longing to bring me home.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Henri Nouwen, <em>You Are Beloved<\/em>, p. 16, quoting from <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sonderbooks.com\/Nonfiction\/return_of_the_prodigal_son.html\">The Return of the Prodigal Son<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Photo: Lake Geneva, Switzerland, November 2000<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For most of my life I have struggled to find God, to know God, to love God. I have tried hard to follow the guidelines of the spiritual life &#8212; pray always, work for others, read the Scriptures &#8212; and to avoid the many temptations to dissipate myself. I have failed many times but always [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-god","category-love"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8923"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8923\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8926,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8923\/revisions\/8926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}