The Loss of Longing
The Bible is dripping with longing. With each new promise and covenant of God, it leads the audience to a longing of when God will finally make all things right that we made wrong. You will be hard pressed to find a book of the Bible that doesn’t bring some form of longing for the audience. Yet it is a reaction that not many of us, I would argue, gravitate towards nor linger for too long. Why is that? So, what? What is the danger? Why does the Bible place so much emphasis on this emotional reaction? What are the effects on our spiritual growth?
What Prevents Longing?
1. Self.
We are the number one enemy of longing. Longing implies that we are incomplete, insufficient, and undone. Our human nature speaks the opposite over us. On the off chance that our insufficiency overwhelms us, we look to the temporal to somehow solve the issue. We categorize what we feel wrongly by approaching like a craving. Longing is not a craving. Attempting to curb our longing with the things of this world is as foolish as trying to cure a rare form of cancer with ice cream. What do you tend to gravitate towards when you feel undone? Work, Food, Exercise, Family, Relationships, Entertainment, etc?
2. The World.
No one may be more aware of our nearly constant feeling of being without than advertisers. Everything that we want is a click of a button away. With DoorDash, it is food. With Social Media, it is friendship and self-affirmation. With Amazon, it is a little bit of everything. Be honest, if your Prime package takes longer than 2 days to deliver, are you throwing a fit? If that friend doesn’t like your post, are you spiraling into despair? The appeal of these things is that they promise instant gratification and satisfaction in our moments of inadequacy. Longing doesn’t provide instant gratification. Longing implies trust that this solution that is to come is the ONLY solution to what really ails us. The World promises something that is within your grasp. Just take it. These thoughts will go away. These feelings will cease. But do they? Longing holds up a promise that is always out of reach to us, because we are not God. Longing requires trust in God’s goodness and faithfulness. Longing is the ultimate delayed gratification.
3. Incomplete Gospel-Centered Teaching.
Wait, what!? The trend of Gospel-centered teaching within the evangelical church has had many beautiful Kingdom outcomes. One subtle trend I see is that the Gospel of the Bible is being preached up to a point that would lead to a lack of longing for the Second Coming of Jesus. The Gospel-centered trend has brought about a beautiful emphasis on the Holiness of God, His Justice against Sin, Jesus’s Perfect Life, His Substitutionary Death on the Cross, and Our Reconciliation to God by Faith Alone in Jesus. The unintentional outcome of this emphasis is that it breeds an idea of completeness in Christ currently. To a certain extent this is correct. For those who are in Christ, we are fully forgiven, reconciled, adopted children of God. But we still sin against one another and God. We still experience the effects of sin in this world. There are a lot of things that are not right about us and the world. This is where longing comes in to play. There are so many promises in the Bible, that are ours in Christ, that we will never experience until His Second Coming. There is more Gospel (Good News) than just our justification by faith alone.
4. Failure to See How Longing Leads to Spiritual Growth.
Spiritual Leaders, we don’t foster longing enough in the people that God has given us to shepherd. Imagine preaching a message (or hearing a message) that provides no solution or application other than to wait on the Lord to return. This may not strike the congregation with great thrill and practice. Let’s face it. We like the do’s and don’ts. Pastors, we like to be the ones with the answers. Leading people to long for the return of the Lord sounds like a cop-out. We are tempted to find more practical teachings and applications. But what if the main point of the text is to induce longing for God’s return? When we fall into this snare, then the full Counsel of God is not proclaimed, taught, learned, or lived. Longing increases trust in the Lord. It stirs our affections for the Lord. It increases our desires to be in the presence of God. It leads us to learn more about this God, who is the Answer to all of our woes. It loosens our grip on the world and tightens our grasp on Him, the object of our worship. What more would you want from your spiritual walk?
How to Foster Longing:
1. Own Your Undone-ness.
Are you tired of struggling with the same sin? Does nothing that you try seem to work? Nothing fosters longing like the idea of how personally wretched you are and how there will be a day that you will no longer sin.
The nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will give. You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.
— Isaiah 62:2–3
2. Own The World’s Undone-ness.
Are you tired of war? Death? Disease? There is a day coming where there will be no more tears. No more death. No more war. Eternal Peace.
I will rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in my people; no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping and the cry of distress. — Isaiah 65:19
3. Read the Bible with Longing in Mind.
Biblical Reading to Foster Longing: Isaiah Chapters 54–66 What is the Lord promising? How do we experience some of that now? What do we still have to look forward to? When will we experience these promises in their fullness? Is your longing for the second coming of the Lord increasing?
4. Trust in the Unfulfilled Promises of God and Be Encouraged.
We are no different than every major character in the Bible. To be a part of the Covenant People of God is to trust in an unfulfilled promise of His. In looking to His Second Coming, we are following in the footsteps of all the saints that have come before us. It is good to long. We are being obedient when we long. Those who have passed, with unveiled eyes are gazing upon our Lord right now. We will one day as well. For the Christian, the best is yet to come! Don’t deny yourself the experience of longing.
He who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen. — Revelation 22:20–21
