17th February 2015

My son is currently searching for the north island of New Zealand. For his birthday he received a map of the world in a thousand jigsaw pieces, but has now the ‘problim’ of finding the piece that is shaped like a cloud. Admittedly it’s not quite a ‘Boy’s Own’ type adventure, and a bit disappointing that he can only enter the experience of global discovery in a cardboard sort of way.

Several hundred years ago, the map of the world was still being drawn, and the exact number of lonely islands was still an open question. Children of yester-year grew up in an age of discovery and genuine quest. But those days are gone. The map is complete, and all the islands that exist have been accounted for.

But yet there is a true quest that still remains for my boys, and for their boys after them. That quest for the land where the tree of life grows, and where the river runs clean, and where the light never fades. That land where the city teems with life, and is adorned by the highest culture, and where angels live with men. That land where at its centre is a sea of glass, upon which is a throne, upon which sits Him whose land it is. And there, on bended knee and in humble adoration, ends the quest, in finding something that the compass of a Columbus could not find. True north and true life.

DM 17^th February 2015