Longing

What we want is to last forever. All the things we jump for- drugs, youthfulness, style, fashion, popularity, wealth, power, status- even sometimes relationships, are figureheads for something else. The closer you look at all of these things, the more you’ll see that there is something behind all of them that you want so much more; something you crave in earnest- so much you may even give your life for it. The longing to be remembered fondly, to last completely forever only better and be so much more than you are now- to literally become total perfection. What most of us forget, myself included, is that He wants all these things for us as well. They are inside of us because He has placed the desire in us, just as He has placed hunger for food, for companionship, for shelter. Where we have it wrong is that we think we can find it all here. We are searching for food in an art gallery, looking for great paintings in the supermarket. All the facelifts, every drug manufactured, each new clothing line- all the money and success in the world will never be enough to satisfy this craving. We shall find in the end only an empty disappointment with it all. Like the man who sailed across the world to an island he had heard about all his life, the end result is somehow a letdown. Not to worry, we were made for much greater lands than these. The wooden prison walls enclosing us have a pinhole with the smallest bit of light shining through. It’s a small clue, to be sure, but it does tell me that the walls are not solid. There’s something outside, something just for us. What is beyond is real life, the real life we have longed for, that we would even die for.