C. S. Lewis once wrote, "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."

 

Inside each person is a longing for something better, something greater.  People try to satisfy this longing through a variety of means.  Money, success, nice houses, family, sex, booze, drugs, television, the internet, and religion are just some of the ways that people attempt to fulfill this insatiable longing.  Maybe you have felt this way before, like everywhere you turn the grass looks greener than where you are.  Like a mirage on the horizon that looks so wonderful, but you can't ever quite reach.  Maybe you feel this way right now.  Perhaps you feel this way a lot.  I've got bad news, none of the things listed above will EVER fill that longing.  They may provide a temporary relief, but not lasting satisfaction.

 

The GOOD NEWS however, is that there is a promise of being filled.  Jesus said, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be filled."  As C.S. Lewis indicated, nothing on this Earth can fill our hunger, but Jesus can satisfy us.  He satisfies us by giving us His righteousness, and allowing us to meet and experience God.  When you come into the prescence of the one who created you, and through whom all things are held together, what else do you need?

 

Yesterday, I had a wonderful discussion with a coworker, who expressed his frustration regarding "Christians."  This young man is searching for the truth, and wrestling with the realities of this world.  He describes walking in the forest near his house and told me he sees God there every afternoon.  When he reads the Bible it rings true.  However when he visits chruches, he doesn't see God anywhere.  My coworker described the churches he has attended, as being about themselves, and vastly different from the God he identifies in the Bible, or the one that made his forest. 

 

I hope that one day he experiences the saving grace and communion with the God he seeks.  In the meantime, I am thankful that New Life is a body of people who truly seek after God, and do not look for satisfaction in the things of this world.  Praise God that our theology and our reality are not so far apart that they set us up for ridicule.