Remembering
Do you remember when you first fell in love with your spouse? I do. Ron and I had a long-distance courtship – 200 miles. And because we are of a certain age, we didn’t have any of the instant apps available today. We wrote love letters, made cassette tapes, and paid for long-distance phone calls. I longed to see him, and on the days when I knew he was coming to town, I awaited his arrival with great anticipation. Fast forward 50 years – I still long to see him, even when he is gone for a few hours, and I look forward to his coming home. I pepper him with questions to hear about his exploits – even if he was just gone a few hours to play pickleball! I think it is safe to say he feels the same way. Our love and longing for one another has not waned.
Recently we discussed how the love and longing we feel in our marriage is an illustration, a picture of Advent. But it is more than that. It should also help us understand our motivation for loving and longing for God daily.
David, the Psalmist, writes, “O God, you are my God; I earnestly search for you. My soul thirsts for you; my whole body longs for you in this parched and weary land where there is no water” (Ps. 63:1).
This Advent season, as we meditate on the coming of Jesus, we ask the Spirit of God to awaken our desire so that our love and longing to be with Him, converse with Him, and enjoy His presence daily will be obvious.
What is Advent
Advent: The season of Advent in the Christian calendar anticipates the “coming of Christ” from three different perspectives: the physical nativity in Bethlehem, the reception of Christ in the heart of the believer, and the eschatological Second Coming. (Wikipedia)
Charles Wesley wrote a favorite Advent hymn. In just the first verse of the hymn, Wesley outlines several significant theological truths:
Come, thou long expected Jesus, born to set thy people free;
Charles Wesley 1707-1788
from our fears and sins, release us, let us find our rest in thee.
Israel’s strength and consolation, hope of all the earth thou art;
dear desire of every nation, joy of every longing heart.
Jesus is the anticipated Messiah.
First, Jesus was the expected one, the anticipated Messiah. His name was not revealed in the old covenant but was given to Joseph months before the child’s birth.
He is the deliverer.
Second, Jesus came to set people free. I love Jesus’ pronouncement of his mission in Luke 4 when he quotes Isaiah in the synagogue. He emphasizes deliverance as His mission!
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
Luke 4:18-19
for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,
that the blind will see,
that the oppressed will be set free,
and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.”
In Him, we have forgiveness.
Third, Jesus releases us from our sin and fear. We have the gift of forgiveness through His birth, life, death, and resurrection. The most common admonition in scripture is to fear not – His perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18).
He is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased our freedom with the blood of his Son and forgave our sins. He has showered his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding.
Ephesians 1:7-8 NLT
He is our rest.
Wesley reminds us in his hymn that we find our rest in Jesus. Again, a favorite invitation in Scripture is recorded by Matthew: “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light” (Matthew 11:28-30)
Hope for all the earth is found in Him.
Jesus is Israel’s strength and consolation, the fulfillment of the old covenant, the Messiah they longed for. But in ushering in His kingdom, he invited all people to come to Him – the hope of all the earth, the desire of every nation. I’m reminded of John’s revelation, that glimpse of the nations adoring and praising the king:
After this I saw a vast crowd, too great to count, from every nation and tribe and people and language, standing in front of the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes and held palm branches in their hands. And they were shouting with a great roar, “Salvation comes from our God who sits on the throne and from the Lamb!”
Revelation 7:9-10
He is our joy.
In Jesus’ High Priestly prayer, he said he spoke his prayer while still with his disciples so they would have the full measure of my joy. It was the prayer of His heart that we would be filled with His joy! He satisfies our longing hearts!
“The disciple Jesus loved was reclining next to Jesus. He leaned back on Jesus’ breast” (John 13:23, 25). We must not hurry past this scene in search of deeper revelation, or we will miss a magnificent insight. John lays his head on the heart of God. … As John leans back on the breast of Jesus and listens to the heartbeat of the Great Rabbi, he comes to know Him in a way that surpasses mere cognitive knowledge. What a world of difference lies between knowing about someone and knowing Him. … For John the heart of Christianity was not an inherited doctrine but a message born of his own experience. And the message he declared was, “God is love” (1 John 4:16).
~ Brennan Manning, Abba’s Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging, p. 124-125.
Knowing Him
In some ways, it might be unfortunate that knowledge about Jesus is common in our culture. Because we know about Him, we sometimes mistake that for knowing HIm. What does it mean to know Jesus?
Let me return to a bit of our personal history. Before Ron and I were in love, we had met and knew of one another. I knew about Ron, and he knew about me – not many details, but we had met and conversed. It was nine or ten months before we saw each other again, before we were in each other’s company, falling in love with one another. During those months, there was no desire, longing, or anticipation of seeing one another again. Knowing about one another was not all the same as knowing one another.
Knowing Jesus involves a personal relationship, conversation, commitment, and surrender. We know Jesus as Savior, Lord, Redeemer, our King. God rescues us from the kingdom of darkness and transfers us into Jesus’ Kingdom because Jesus purchased our freedom and forgave our sins. It’s because of this glorious new life that our hearts and minds know Jesus Himself – and our love and desire for Him is awakened.
“The engaged mind, illuminated by truth, awakens awareness; the engaged heart, affected by love, awakens passion. May I say once more – this essential energy of the soul is not an ecstatic trance, high emotion or a sanguine stance toward life: It is a fierce longing for God, an unyielding resolve to live in and out of our belovedness. … The integration of mind and heart shapes a unified personality living in a state of passionate awareness.
~ Brennan Manning, Abba’s Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging, p. 156
The So What Question
Now and then, we need to stop and take stock of our relationship with Jesus. Are we assuming we know Him just because we know about Him? What is the status of our relationship? I invite you to join me in prayer to ask the Spirit of God to shine His light into the dark recesses of our souls, to illuminate truth for us, and to set our hearts on fire for Him!
“The soul must long for God in order to be set aflame by God’s love; but if the soul cannot yet feel the longing, then it must long for the longing. To long for the longing is also from God.”
~ Meister Eckhart