Restless Longing

A longing so intense,
It pulls me from this world.
A cry so loud,
It shatters the façades of society.
A hunger so deep
Nothing can satisfy it -
Nothing but infinite beauty.

All this age, with all its values,
All its promises, all its pleasures.
All this world
Is a prison.
I look out of my cell,
And see freedom -
True life lived in light and joy.
My arm squeezes through the bars
My fingers outstretched,
My hand trembling with exertion -
Yet, for all my efforts, I cannot escape.
I am trapped.

Can I be set free?
Men have for ages crashed
Upon these impenetrable cliffs.
Cliffs that are not seen,
But felt deep within.
Yet, one escape we know,
Though we fear to say it.
An escape that no one has ever escaped.

We all feel it in our own way,
Though few are aware,
And fewer yet will admit.
We long for something more...
But, more of what?
We do not know.
Our hunger is for something
We have never tasted.
Is it to reach beyond
And touch the eternal?

Oh, I am not satisfied
With the paltry thrills of
Light and sound upon my senses.
Something stirs deep within,
An echo in my soul
Of something greater, higher
Than all the numbing pleasures
We men invent for ourselves.
There is something there,
I feel it... can almost touch it.
It is whispering to me
In the movements of my heart.
It is speaking to me
When I gaze upon the beauty of a rose.
It is smiling at me
When I pause beneath the moon
To feel its silvery winds blow
Through my soul.

I ache to reach out
And pull back the veil
Of the physical...
To reveal the ocean of
Deeper reality upon whose
Surface our universe plays out
Like a rippling reflection.
I wish to dive into that abyss
And lose myself in its wonder,
To break forth from its depths
Into the glorious sunshine,
And swim to the fully dimensional
Person standing in the brilliant Light -
Of whose shadow cast upon
The waves is our cosmos.

But, my mind returns to its place
Here in this world.
I realize I'm still standing
Below the moon.
I sigh deeply, turn,
And walk back to my home.

We all feel it, don't we?
We all feel like there is something more, something beyond, something transcendent. That longing for something better, or that feeling things are not quite right. Is this just a mental appendage from millions of years of evolution? Or do we sense that this physical world is a temporary boundary around our eternal souls?

Oh that I could touch the Eternal!
Oh that I could see Him face to face!
Oh that I could speak to Him!
Oh that I could know Him,
Put my arms around Him,
Experience true love.

The love my soul has always longed for, but never known. Oh, I've known the finest love this earth can produce. My wife has shown it to me. But even that seems a shadow of the love my soul hungers for.

I hunger to weep at my Savior's feet, cling to Him in utter dependence, and hear Him say, "well done." I long for Him to accept me. I long for Him to smile on me. I long to be important to Him. To be loved by Him. To be known by Him. To be considered, listened to, cared for. I long to express my undying loyalty and devotion.

And yet, for all my longing, I am continually choosing the things of this transient world over Him. Do I not truly believe what I long to believe? What does this mean? It means I weep all the more at His feet, for He tells me He loves me and has redeemed me.

Reveal Yourself to me! I want to see you high and lifted up while I am still alive on this earth. I long for a vision so powerful it overcomes all other earthly loves.