What are you longing for? This is not meant to be a trick question or to get your honest response to only turn around and bash that response. What are you longing for? Today as I sit in my office I am contemplating that question for myself. What is it that I am really longing for?
I know what I want the answer to be. I want to long for God. I want to be like A.W. Tozer who once commented to a friend that He wanted to love God more than anyone in his generation. I don’t think I can truthfully say that. My longings get diverted. When I get honest I can’t think of many material things I want. I have a true soul mate in my wife. My boys are a delight to my soul and I would not trade them for others. I have all the clothes I need and then some. As much as I love books I actually discarded a book catalogue yesterday because I have countless number of books I have not gotten around to reading yet. My shelves are full. I have been blessed with transportation, a house, I have a wonderful job, and I work with people I not only like but, enjoy being around. What I most want to long for though is more of God.
I want to long for private worship experiences with Him that defy explanation. I want to long more and more to pull away from the throngs of people to some secluded place to enjoy God, to sit with Him, converse with Him, abide in Him, and adore Him. I don’t have to have bright lights, television cameras, talented musicians, or a crowded sanctuary. I want to be in the habit of private worship services that are born out of my longing heart. I long to be renewed continually in my inner man so that I am not going through the motions of religious activity void of a true and authentic love for Christ. I do not want to be a preacher or author with all the right words to say or write but no inner experience to back all the preaching and writing up.
In a world of many longings there is one longing that alone should triumph the throne of my heart and that is the longing to know God. I fear that far too many people in church waste their days learning more about God but never coming to a true and intimate knowledge of God. I pray I will never settle for this. I know down deep that He alone can satisfy. Other things may appear to satisfy for a season but soon they wear off. My soul is thirsty for the living water that can only be found in the reservoir of Jesus. It is when I stop long enough to satisfy this intense craving of my soul and drink long and deep from the fountains of His everlasting spring that I am truly alive.
As of late I have been so busy with important but lesser important things. My soul feels somewhat withered and what is the most troubling is that at times it has seemed that my longing heart has weakened. I want the intensity of longing after Christ more than I long for my next meal. I never want to be content to live on spiritual experiences of my past. Today is different. As I have intentionally sought to slow down, to think deeply, to let the deepest longings of my heart resurface, I am finding my soul coming to life again like the dry grass in the fields after a good and soaking rain when they turn green and begin to shoot up.
Maintaining a longing heart in this world is not easy. There are multitudes of things that compete with our affections. Many urges and longings surface that crowd out Christ. One thing I have learned over these twenty plus years of walking with Him, it takes time and effort to go after the life long quest to know God. It is not an easy journey and many times I find myself far too easily amused with the stuff of this earth as C.S. Lewis said. There are days when I do not long to pray, read scripture, or to sit with the Savior. My longing heart is dulled by fatigue, the desire for less demanding pleasures and experiences.
In my mind I know longing for Christ is better but in my flesh I can be distracted and lose focus. A little over a month ago I was enjoying some of the most intimate times with the Lord I had ever known. Prayer was a true joy and hours were spent in the presence of God in worship and intercession. Now I am finding my affections for the Lord dulled and my will to go hard after Him lessened. Mostly it is fatigue and over commitment. I know this is no accident. My adversary would love to keep me distractedly busy and to enter the pulpit the hollow shell of a man of God with nothing to say but the echoes of other men. A true longing heart will lead me to His presence and from His presence I will be able to step in the pulpit not with a sermon but with a message from God.
What are you and I longing for? I want to long for God. I want to long for Him more than a crack addict longs for more drugs or the lover longs to be in the arms of his or her companion. I want to long for Christ more than the businessman longs for the next deal and turning a profit. I want to crave closer communion with Christ more than the athlete desires the championship.
Lord Jesus, I confess that I am far too easily distracted from the deepest longing in my heart for you. Over and over again I feel I am on this spiritual roller coaster with many ups and downs. I long to be eternally attracted to you. I want to devalue all things in light of the surpassing value of knowing you. [Phil 3:8] I ask you to intensify my longing for you day in and day out so much so that lesser longings get crowded out. I want to know the joy of walking with you and the joy of enjoying you through out all my days. I will never be content to know about you but long to know you. May I never be satisfied until you are truly the deepest longing of my heart? Perhaps one day like Tozer I too might say I long to love you more than anyone in my generation. Please intensify my longing heart until that is true all the remaining days of my life.
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