Beautiful Longing

Her unmarried teenager daughter got pregnant. She was devastated and really mad!

She confided in a Christian friend. The suggestion was that she pray and read the Bible more in order to get closer to the Lord and find some peace. She did and over the next few years did well with the whole situation. She was able to see the blessing of her new grandchild and the positive changes in her daughter.

Two years later, her still unmarried daughter became pregnant again. She was devastated – again. She reached out to her Christian friend but when the previous advice to lean into the Lord was reinforced she angrily responded, “That might work for you but it doesn’t work for me!”

It became clear that her relationship with the Lord was transactional; i.e. “If I do this, the Lord will do that.” In her mind, if she did her part by praying more, reading the Bible more and attending church more, then God would do His part and keep unpleasant things out of her life.

This worked for a while; until it didn’t.

This begged a question: “So, what can she do?” This immediately expands into “So, what can WE all do?” when we are in similar situations.

The first thought that comes is the well-worn Evangelical Christian suggestion that we are all created with a “God hole” that can only be filled by God. And that anxiety and desperation will be exchanged with peace and a feeling of well-being as the “hole” is filled with God’s presence.

But this doesn’t line up with God’s true character and nature as expressed by Jesus: “I am with you always” (Matthew 28:20) and “I will not leave you as orphans; ” (John 14:18). So there was no need to design man with a “God hole” since He is with us always.

What then? The understanding “came” that instead of a hole we all have a God-created longing for Him.

A hole describes something that needs to be filled until it disappears. Longing is “near and dear” to us. Longing doesn’t stand apart from us. Longing is a part of us. We never want our longing for God to be satisfied or disappear. We want it to remain and even be deepened, expanded.

So, what does this look like? During times of difficulty, tragedy, etc. feel the longing for God and move into it. “Pull on heaven” to enlarge and enhance your longing for God until it fills every crevice of your earthly life on to eternity! 

God inhabits our longing for Him!