The Hunger for God (2026)

At the end of 1987, I finished up my time in the little church of St. Andrew’s, Kirkland Lake – my first church – and moved to the rapidly expanding village of Unionville, Ontario, just above the north east corner of Toronto. Unionville Presbyterian Church was just getting started and I was called in to grow the church and lead the congregation in putting up their first building.

We lived in a nice suburb just off Main Street Unionville - that was to be my home for the next twelve and a half years. It was a really great neighbourhood. Lots of young families. Lots of kids. Now, right across the road from us there was a couple we became friendly with – Judy and Ben. They had two little boys – maybe about one and three years old. Ben loved to go fishing, and towards the end of the first summer we were there, Ben went on the fishing trip of a lifetime. Along with three other fishing buddies, they flew into a remote lake in Northern Ontario. Judy and the kids stayed behind. They had a great week of fishing. The small little bush plane came back to pick them up.

To this day, I don’t think anybody knows what happened, but the plane never cleared the treeline. It crashed into the woods, killing everyone on board. That tragedy just rocked our little neighbourhood. We couldn’t believe it. This wonderful young man – young family – two small children. Judy, now a widow in her late twenties. It was one of the first funerals I did in town.

While the grief was still in the air, along came this red-hot evangelist for some church in the area. He rang our doorbell. I went to the door.

This evangelist said to me, “You know what happened to the young man across the street?”

“Yes, it’s just so sad – leaving behind a young wife and two small children. We’re all just an emotional mess over this.”

Then he stared directly into my eyes and said, “Well, what about your soul? If you died tonight, do you know where you’re going?”

Honestly, I wanted to punch him in the nose! He was using that tragedy to coerce and frighten people. Of all the sub-Christian things to do.

I said to him, “I’m the new minister at Unionville Presbyterian Church. I did the funeral service for that young man. And I don’t like the way you’re using his death to try and get new members for your church!”

And he told me, “Well, if you’re a minister you know our job is to win new converts for Christ. Don’t you know what it says in scripture, “Go and make disciples of all nations, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”

He said, “I’m just trying to make disciples, that’s all. You should be too!”

Well, we argued for a bit. He didn’t change my mind, and I don’t think I changed his, but he did leave the neighbourhood, or maybe he just went around the corner to the next street, I don’t know, maybe he meant well, thought he was doing God’s work, but it just didn’t feel right to me. You see, here’s the thing. I don’t like that way of doing things.

He would say, “I’m just saving souls like Jesus told us.”

And I would say, “NO! You’re manipulating people and playing on their emotions when they’re hurting and vulnerable.” To me it’s like lawyers chasing ambulances and handing out their business cards at the accident site.

And I know there’s a school of Christian evangelism teaching that very strategy – “You won’t get them when things in their life are going well, but just keep circling, and when they ‘go down’ – lose a job, lose a loved one, go through a divorce – that’s when you swoop in and pick them off! ‘Make disciples,’ just like Jesus told us to do!”

So, now, what did Jesus mean when he said, “Go into the whole world and make disciples?” Some people misread that word “make” as if he’s ordering them to command people to become disciples – coerce people to make disciples, make them become disciples. That’s not what it means. It simply means, “Disciple everybody.” It’s a verb – “disciple” people. How do you “disciple” people?

Well,the same way Jesus did. He loved them. He blessed them. He helped them, and some of them didn’t care. But you don’t get huffy and mad.

There was a rich young ruler who came, and in some anguish, he said to Jesus “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Jesus looked at him and loved him. And Jesus said, “Your life is so absolutely cluttered. You’ve got too much stuff. Just give it away to the poor people and then you come follow me.”

And the man became sad and said, “I can’t, I can’t, I just can’t let go of my stuff!”

Jesus gave him room to say No, because if you don’t have room to say no – then Yes doesn’t mean a thing. There’s no coercion.

When Jesus went along through a certain village and he preached and he blessed and they didn’t believe, the disciples became so angry they said, “Do you want us to call down fire from heaven to burn them up?”

Jesus said, “No, leave them alone. We’ll go somewhere else.” Jesus gave people room.

In the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John, Jesus preached a sermon that was very demanding, and everybody left but his twelve disciples, and he said, “Well are you going to leave too?”

And they said, “We have nowhere else to go. You’re the one with eternal life.”

No coercion. No emotional blackmail. Their choice. Their decision.

And Jesus said, “I want you to be this way with everybody in the world.”

And I’m sure that kind of shocked them. And they probably looked at each other and said, “Everybody? Everybody includes a lot of people I don’t like.” And Jesus said, “Everybody.”

“But we’ll have problems if we have everybody. If you just say everybody’s welcome, then what are you going to get?! Everybody’s welcome?”

Jesus said, “There was a man who sowed wheat in his field, and one day the servants saw there were a bunch of weeds out there, and they came in and said, “Sir there are weeds in the field. Do you want us to pull up the weeds?”

And he said, “No. You leave the weeds alone. You start pulling up the weeds and you’ll tear up the wheat. You just leave it alone. At harvest time there’ll be a difference between weeds and wheat. Leave it alone! You just make disciples. And those who are ready and willing, baptize them, bring them into the church.”

This is important – it’s that transition. People start out in their relationship to Christ like being engaged … maybe just dating at first, and then becoming engaged and then they get married – they reach a point of saying, “I commit myself publicly before God and relatives and friends – I commit myself to this person as long as we both shall live.”

That’s a covenant. That’s what people do when they join the church – confessing their faith and trust in Christ. Saying publicly, “I want to be numbered among the followers of Jesus.” But of course, that’s not the end of it. That’s just the beginning!

Because Jesus went on to say, “I want you to teach them. Teach them all that I have commanded you – teach them!” Help people deepen and mature in faith.

Personally, I think people want to know:

What does scripture say?

What does God want me to do with my life?

What does the Bible say about prayer and worship and service?

How can I experience the presence of Christ in my life?

People may disguise it. Act like they don’t. Say all kinds of silly things. Make some jokes. Be embarrassed about it. But they really want to know.

It’s true of young people. Over the course of the years I’ve been a minister, I’ve frequently given leadership to High School age Youth Groups. And I need to tell you, I’ve had the most incredible discussions concerning life and faith with teenagers. The people who say all our kids want is to be entertained. They’re wrong. They are flat wrong! Our young people have questions – deep and profound questions. They wonder about all kinds of things. And they really want to learn and grow! And I’ve been challenged by young people and the great questions they’ve asked me.

He said, “Well I’ve been told by lots of people that I should make my life what God would have it to be. How can I know what that is? How can I know?”

And she says, “Well, a friend of mine in my class at school was a victim of suicide, and her minister said it was the unpardonable sin. What do you think? Did Jesus say anything about suicide?”

Did you know she’s 14 years old and asked me what Jesus said about suicide. Jesus said, “Teach them.” And I know there are a lot of churches now – very popular churches – some of them just humongous churches whose primary concern is to be consumer conscious – consumer oriented, consumer driven. We have to deliver the right “church experience.” And what people want is something lively and entertaining. But if you think that’s finally and deeply and ultimately what people find interesting, you’re wrong. What is interesting, is that which touches my life at the deepest point – whether I’m six or ninety-six.

“If Jesus was the Son of God, couldn’t he have gotten out of being killed? If he was the Son of God, couldn’t he have made sure that didn’t happen? I mean, what’s the point of believing in God if you can’t get out of stuff?” Who asked that? A thirteen year old - isn’t that remarkable.

That’s why Jesus told us, “I want you to teach them what I said on all these subjects.”

Just teach them! You can’t make them do it, but they want to know. I think personally, the reason Jesus said, “Make disciples of all nations and teach them,” is because all nations – everybody in the world – wants to know something about God. Do you believe that? I do. Everybody wants to know about God. Under all the noise, all the bravado, all the resistance, I believe there is in every human heart a quiet ache for God. Jesus knew that.

That’s why he said: “GO! - not to conquer, not to coerce - but to love, to teach, and to trust that somewhere inside every soul, there is already a hunger, waiting to be named.”