Did you know that you are on a journey?
In the scriptures we are told that we are a pilgrim people St. Paul calls us strangers and soujourners, two words that basically mean we are foreigners, visitors in a strange land.
So where are we going? We get a clue in the Gospel today. Who does Phillip say He wants to see?
The Father! And where is the Father?
You see God created all things and everything that exists has a little bit of God's goodness in it; for us humans, who are made in God's image and likeness, there is a whole lot of God's goodness in us already. But can you ever have too much goodness?
Who here likes ice cream? In my family we always said there is always room for ice cream! But God is even better than ice cream! and even if one day we get tired of our favorite food, our favorite toy, our favorite sport, or activity we will never get tired with God, because God is a mystery, the closer we get to Him the more we realize there is to know and love!
All of us long in their heart to return to their creator, just like we all love to be near our parents, because God is the ultimate parent, the ultimate Father, who Phillip wants to see.
We too want to see God! And while we can see him in His creation, just like we might see a person in a photo or in something they did or made, ultimate we want to see God the way we see our parents face to face. We all want to give God a great big hug and get one back from Him. We want to hear Him say you are my beloved son, my beloved daughter, with whom I am well pleased.
And so we are all on a journey. Where? To heaven, of course!!!
We started this journey the day we were baptized, the day we were set free from this world and our sins so that we could search for God. And we continue it today.
Today our God who loves us, and realizes that it's hard: to keep our eyes set on Him to avoid all the distractions along the long road of life; to have the strength and courage to be holy; to be the saint He made us to be--our God gives us a little help.
What does He give us? He give us His son, the body of Christ, God became man so that he could remind us of our destination, show us the way, and strengthen us for the journey! When we see Jesus see the Father, as we heard today in the Gospel and we desire to get closer to God.
When we see the Father in Jesus we follow Jesus who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Jesus is the only way to the Father and so seeing God in Jesus we follow Him. Finally Jesus' way leads to the cross, where Jesus dies to give us His Body and Blood the strength we need to follow Him, and to mimic His example.
God made us to love Him and serve Him, and by doing so to come through this life to the eternal happiness of Heaven.
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