Longings

Some days my heart yearns with heavenly longings.

Some days the wretchedness of this earth threatens to overwhelm me with its brokenness.

When I see the confusion, the hurt, the desperation of hearts searching, the utter lostness of a world floundering to obtain love in all the wrong places.

It is in these moments I am most reminded I am not created for this earth.

This world was never destined to hold the answer to the desires of my heart’s quest.

No matter how amazing the temporal can be, it remains temporary. Each earthly relationship merely a quick-fix for this innate desire to be known and accepted. Just as I am.

This mystery of heavenly longing goes beyond all things natural, yet, I seldom ponder the truth of living in my smoke-screened reality. Too often appeased by a mirage. Too readily succumbing to the illusion of happily-ever-after in earthly garb.

I ignore the confines of my mortality as I go through the motions of routine activity. Content to while away my days, forgetting they are so very few.

But when I pause to glance heavenward, I remember.

It is in these moments of looking up that I reach beyond the finite and bump against the whispers of God-breath caressing me with Your presence.

It is here that the deepest parts of me come to life when I am most aware of my eternal value and my eternal existence.

It is here that I am drawn further into Your waves of grace, immersed in a love that goes beyond what mortal eyes can behold.

There is a fascination that moves me toward You, Father. An ache that pulls me into Your presence, past these gasps for earthly fulfillment. I shift a little nearer and am wrapped in wonder as I move deeper into the mystery of Your love.

Overwhelmed with the longing to return home, I teeter between the now and the not yet.

In this ache to be done with this earth, I ask You to balance my heart.

Breathe Your peace into my spirit.

Pound out the steady rhythm of Hope’s heartbeat against my own as You dare me to live true and love large while I wait.

Unite this division in my soul.

Bridge the present with Your eternal presence and remind me all is well because You are here.

Here where I cannot see clearly.

Here where sin seems to have won out.

Here where I most need You to be.

Architect of the Infinite, come and set things right once more as You consume this darkness with the light of heaven’s glow bending earthward.

Let salvation work its magic for now and for forever.

Turn my heart toward home even as I live on foreign sod, and let Your glory be a part of every moment.

Until every moment becomes eternity.

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
– Ecclesiastes 3:11, NIV

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FOR REFLECTION

Do you ever find yourself longing for heaven, or does the pull of this earth’s trappings keep you grounded more in the temporary than the eternal? Are you disheartened or hopeful that God is still at work in this mess of humanity at odds with its Creator?

Honestly, some days, it feels as though I brace myself for impact more than with an air of anticipation that God is up to something fascinating. My outlook can be grim if I neglect to notice His presence is wholly a part of every moment. And choose to step into it. (Both the moment and His presence, simultaneously.)

Hope comes in linking God’s eternal otherworldliness with our temporal moments. How will you choose to live expectantly and bring a bit of heaven to earth today?