Fulfilling basic needs
When people lived from hunting and gathering, they had to search for food and water. Wild animals still do the same. “Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather in barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them” (Matt. 6:26).
Instead of constant moving from place to place, mankind domesticated certain plants and animals, producing food for themselves. With this subsistence farming, the necessities of life were readily available. Grain, dried fruits, cheese, and salted meat could be stored for a while.
When people multiplied and congregated in towns and cities, economic cycles of interdependence developed: farming, mining, fishing, logging, building, factories, shops, and services provided by the private and public sectors. However, to find what you need, you still have to search online or by car.
Students search their interests and abilities to choose a career. Then they search for work and a place to stay, and for a mate to share their life with.
We hope to find happiness, success, and fulfilment in home and work. Life is not perfect: our peace is often disturbed by nasty problems like exhaustion, illness, accidents, relations, expenses, crime, and natural disasters.
Therefore, we need to escape occasionally on long weekends and vacations. And where do most people go? To nature – where our ancestors lived. We find it in parks, camping, resorts, tourism, cruises, and traveling. But we don’t want to do it alone; we want to enjoy life in good company.
The need for belonging, togetherness, sharing, communication, giving and receiving love is so vital to human existence that it influences our entire lives: work, home and enjoyments.
Relationships are important: all of the Ten Commandments are about our relationship with God and people. Common sense agrees that love for God and others is the right thing to do. St. Paul said that love harms nobody; therefore, love fulfils the law (Rom. 13:10).
What Jesus said about prayer is also true of our social needs: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and your will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” (Matt. 7:7). There must be an effort from our side to develop friendships: ask, seek, knock.
The stories Jesus told to illustrate truth can be traced to relationships. The seed that falls on four kinds of soil points to the way people respond to the word of God. The leaven that is mixed with the dough, changing it from the inside, shows how Christians should influence society.
The prodigal, who left father and brother for sinful pleasure, depicts the cycle of sin: desire, straying, consequences, remorse, insight, turning around, and reconciliation with God and people.
People need to give and receive love.
Jacob Van Zyl of Lethbridge is a retired counsellor and the author of several faith-based books.