A Distant Shore

Sometimes I am beset with this sense of restlessness and desire to be somewhere else, anywhere else than I am now. Going there (wherever “there” is) does not fix it. I become discontent and unable to settle down to my work without thinking that I'd rather be playing tennis,... or talking to somebody,....or alone, often I don't even know what it is I am longing for. I am looking for something on a distant shore; I can't stop squinting my eyes at the horizon longing for a glimpse of that ship. What am I wistful for?

The Lord wants us to be content in Him. He wants to be our everything. And since He made us, he gave us a built in desire for Him. His presence is so much greater, so much more rich and fulfilling than anything we try to replace it with. So that is why nothing else will satisfy.

But as a Christian, why do I still experience this restlessness? Well, I am still a sinner with earthly desires until glorification. This causes a twofold effect. One, as a sinner I still fall into making idols of other things, trying to find satisfaction elsewhere. This cannot do anything but but make my impatience grow as these things fail. Second, I am not yet in His presence the way I will be in Heaven. So part of that longing will always remain while I am yet apart from my Father.

There are places I can go where I find quiet from this impatient spirit. Reading Scripture, praying, and often drawing or painting are some of the ways I spend time with my Maker allowing him to restore my soul. God made us specially with souls that want to drink of the deep. We are eternal beings. Sometimes we want this longing. In the words of C.S Lewis:

If a transtemporal, transfinite good is our real destiny, then any other
good on which our desire fixes must be in some degree fallacious, must
bear at best only a symbolic relation to what will truly satisfy. ... We
cannot tell it [the secret] because it is a desire for something that has
never actually appeared in our experience. ... For they [memories, idols]
are not the thing itself ; they are only the scent of a flower we have
not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we
have never yet visited.

I am content with where I am in my life. And I pray that the Lord would give me ability to appreciate each moment he gives me even now. If I focus my desires on growing closer to Him, then not only will my contentment grow, but also my longing to be with Him. And that would be a good thing :)