Helen Tyte

Where is God?

Today’s theme in church was ‘Seen’ and we were thinking about seeing God, and being seen by God. It reminded me of a story.

Once there were two young brothers who were excessively mischievous. They were always getting into trouble and were driving their parents crazy with their naughty antics. Their teachers were constantly asking the parents to meetings at school to talk about their bad behaviour, and If any mischief took place in their town, the two boys were probably involved.

The boys’ mother was at her wits’ end and had run out of ideas of how to punish them, or what to say to them that would make a difference. She heard from her friends that the local priest in town had been successful in helping to discipline children, so she asked him if he would speak with her boys. The priest agreed, and asked to speak to them individually to find out what was going on. The mother sent the youngest boy first, with his older brother scheduled to see him in the afternoon.

The priest sat the young boy down and asked him sternly, “Do you know God, my son?” The boy’s mouth dropped open, but he made no response, sitting there wide-eyed with his mouth hanging open. So the priest repeated the question in an even sterner tone, “Have you seen God?” Again, the boy made no attempt to answer. The priest raised his voice even more and shook his finger in the boy’s face and bellowed, “Where is God?” The boy jumped up and bolted from the room, ran directly home and jumped into his closet, slamming the door behind him. When his older brother found him in the closet, he asked, “What happened?” The younger brother, gasping for breath, replied, “We are in BIG trouble this time dude. They’ve lost GOD, and they think we did it!”