Pursued

I can’t remember exactly when the term “Hound of Heaven” first entered my consciousness. But gradually, it began shaping my imagination. The phrase evoked relentless pursuit and the inevitability of capture, and I assumed it had been coined by C.S. Lewis. When I finally researched its origin, I was surprised to learn that it was a poem written by a formerly homeless opium addict as he was recovering in the English countryside of 1890.

Francis Thompson had been expected to become a doctor, like his father. After several failed attempts to complete medical school, he became convinced that his true gifts lay in writing. Unable to hold down a job and appease family expectations, he left home to pursue a writing career in London, taking only two books and a few items of clothing. It wasn’t long before he fell into poverty and addiction to laudanum, which had been prescribed for a lengthy illness he’d endured in medical school. 

The crucible of his homeless existence on the banks of the Thames River inspired the work that would make him famous. “The Hound of Heaven” is a long and vivid poem depicting the campaign of God to capture the heart of His wayward son.

Nigh and nigh draws the chase,

With unperturbèd pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy;

And past those noisèd Feet

A voice comes yet more fleet—

“Lo! naught contents thee, who content’st not Me!”

I’ve been a Christian for as long as I can remember, so I can’t lay claim to a dramatic conversion story. The pursuit motif from “The Hound of Heaven” made me curious, and even a little jealous. Do people often sense God’s pursuit before they surrender to Him? What does that dawning awareness look like? I wanted to see the long game of God unfold in people’s lives.

I discovered a treasure trove on Christianity Today’s website, which features a list of their most-read testimonies of recent years. In reading the top 20 conversion stories of the last two years, I noticed similarities: deliverance from addiction, reconciliation in shattered relationships, and transformed lives during periods of incarceration. But just as often, I was struck by the sheer uniqueness of each account. 

I read the story of Sida Lei, the coauthor of Two Teaspoons of Rice: The Memoir of a Cambodian Orphan. Lei recounts her childhood under the totalitarian regime of the Khmer Rouge. When she was ten, her family was forced from their home and made to work in separate labour camps, including one for children. Lei was not particularly religious, but after the deaths of her parents she remembered her mother’s advice: “If you are ever in trouble, Sida, pray to God. He will help you.” It fell to Lei to care for her four siblings, so she prayed for help to survive hunger and malaria, and guidance to escape. She became aware of a powerful Someone watching over her, repeatedly saving them from death “when it was near enough to feel its ghostly breath”. Once they reached freedom across the border in Thailand, Lei came to know who that Someone was: she heard the strains of “Amazing Grace” coming from a nearby church, and when she was introduced to God, she recognized Him as the one who’d watched over her.

God is no less active on the other side of the world. Stu Fuhlendorf recounts how God met him at the peak of corporate success and showed him the emptiness of his pursuits. Over the course of one evening in a hotel room, Fuhlendorf wrestled with philosophical questions about the impact of Jesus’s life on the world. He thought of his wife, a Christian, and the joy her faith seemed to give her. Here’s how he describes what happened next: “Suddenly, I felt a warm wave of energy surge through me, and my eyes welled up with tears. I couldn’t stop it—a feeling of joy but also regret. A feeling of deep and unending love but also a deep sense of the need to repent. It seemed like a light had come on, even though the room was still dark.” Fuhlendorf wept prostrate on the floor for several hours, the experience culminating in a changed heart and life trajectory. He eventually left his business career for full-time ministry, completed rehab for his alcoholism, and wrote Wall Street to the Well: A Story of Transformation from Fortune to Faith.

Lei’s and Fuhlendorf’s stories are just two from the twenty. The list goes on: a world-famous New Age author. A child of the foster system. An intellectual prodigy. A Deadhead. A soldier. From atheists to devout believers of other faiths, I am astounded by the diversity of those called into God’s family.

It’s humbling to consider that I am part of that family. I’m not particularly anything; I don’t draw attention everywhere I go. But God knows everything about me. His vast knowledge includes all the cons of my personality, and yet before time began, He planned to draw me to Him. No deserving on my part could justify it. He just decided to make me His.

Not only does God choose a wide variety of unlikely people, but He personalizes His pursuit down to the smallest detail. These stories make it clear that He knows who He is wooing; each life is curated to reveal Him as the lover of their soul. I read how the Spirit approached some people through their minds, using their questions to lead them to grapple with His word. He reached others through their hearts, healing their emotions and giving them a deep desire for Himself. Some He wooed through music. One man heard an audible voice speak words of life when he was on the brink of suicide. 

I’ve long believed that God knows and works through all things. Yet the circumstances of how these people came to faith – both miraculous and mundane – are fresh evidence of His intentionality and timing. Several people discovered after their conversion that someone had been intentionally praying for them, even for years. (God really does play the long game!) On top of that, He often reveals to His children that they have always been His. Turning to God is, in a sense, a return. A homecoming. Many come to realize that God is what they had been seeking all along, without knowing it. These stories challenge me to consider the limits of my faith and dare me to concede that all things are possible with God.

And so I ask myself: where do I see His initiative at work in my life? In me, the lifelong Christian, who has no spectacular conversion moment to remember? I had assumed that because I am already His, the “pursuit” was over long ago, but I’m beginning to see that is not the case. He is wooing me to this day. 

He has chosen now to show me these examples of His purpose, planning and goodness. Surely, He knows my heart better than I do. He knows I need the reminder that in His kingdom, nothing is ever wasted.  

When I take a step of obedience, I can choose to notice His outstretched hand. When I struggle to trust His plan for my life, I can meet His gentle gaze. I can admit that He has never been generic in His dealings with me.

Like Thompson, I am coming to see that my pursuit of contentment leads me back to the One pursuing me. And I realize, again, that this place of surrender is where I was always meant to be.

Text: Jen McNaughton
Art: Joanne Yau