It’s been many months since I visited the remains of the creek that I found last spring. Finding it was such a joy, and I spent much time on its banks. Then suddenly for many months I did not visit its beauty at all. However, this week, I went there three days in a row, carrying my blue, red, and white striped blanket, expectant of the goodness I would discover as I lay under the clouded sky. Somehow, I am never disappointed when I make an appointment with nature.
I’ve been thinking about the words of a song that I used to listen to in college. Those words connected with my heart then and they connect even deeper now.
I have climbed highest mountain
I have run through the fields
Only to be with you
Only to be with you
I have run, I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you
Only to be with you
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
My life is so full of goodness that sometimes I cannot bear it. Grace does not shortchange me. Miracles abound. Light finds me even through cracks so small they are unseen to the naked eye.
But. But what? There is a place in my heart that remains unquenchable. At least I have not found anything to slake its thirst. I have been searching for the living water for decades but I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
Perhaps it’s my own immaturity that cannot see the truth that often lies just beyond the veil. Some might say that I need a lesson in contentment or simplicity. Probably I do.
But what if contentment and the empty ache can co-exist?
The song goes on,
I have kissed honey lips
Felt the healing in her fingertips
It burned like fire
This burning desire
I have spoke with the tongue of angels
I have held the hand of a devil
It was warm in the night
I was cold as a stone
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
I haven’t done everything, but I’ve done a lot. I have been in heaven and I have descended into hell. I have celebrated my light and sang love songs over my shadow. Some days I show up as superwoman and other days I am able to open my heart to the limitations of my humanity. But still . . . the ache remains. Is this Advent in my heart? The waiting for something that I know exists but has not yet come to me?
I believe in Kingdom come
Then all the colors bleed into one
Bleed into one
But, yes, I’m still runnin’
You broke the bonds
Carried the shame
Loosed the bonds of my chains
Of my chains
You know I believe it
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.
I believe that my bonds are broken and my shame is gone. I understand the miracle — at least at some level. I feel its power in my bones, and I rejoice. But it’s not enough or else the cosmic ache would vaporize? Why does its haunting voice continue arising in my moments of quiet, when I’m still enough to hear the subtle voices of my soul?
"Come,” it seems to beckon, “further up and further in.”
Perhaps the lonely ache that tints everything is the voice of the bottomless Mystery, beckoning me ever onward, ever inward. Closer and closer to its center . . . where what? I don’t know. Perhaps the only way to find out is to hold a posture of gratitude and softness. Perhaps this is faith. A refusal to live from the broken system of the scarcity mindset, and a softness toward all that cannot yet “get there.”