Longing for God

[Mark Dohle]

Longing for God​

Only love radiates the light of God, for His light is love. The light of Jesus Christ is love that suffers for all and with all, love in pain and sorrow, love that enters into the brokenness of humanity and receives her brokenness into Himself to heal and restore her in God. Love receives her wounds and bears them upon His body to heal her with the balm of His tenderness in mercy. The light of the world is Love, the Word Incarnate.​

Community, Love Crucified. Teaching Manual Love Crucified
2020 (p. 4). Kindle Edition.
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I find myself praying for a deeper longing for God. I sometimes get tired of my rock-like heart. I do not understand why the door seems closed…. yet I also understand it is from my side that the door is shut. It is not something that I want, but it is based on some sort of wound that is trying to save me from more suffering. Yet all healing incorporates suffering.

As I age and my death seems closer than ever this longing is growing but I still remain cold more often than not. On the other hand, my thirst for prayer deepens as well as my understanding that I also fight it. It comes from a deep place this inner struggle, so I must wait, pray, and not lose hope.

Jesus carries my pain, He embraces me and will not let me go, yet I am in this place of ‘hardness’, and at the same time a feeling that my heart is melting. It comes out in my Lectio. I will read a phrase, and I am filled with this deep inner longing for ‘home’, a place that if I experienced it fully would destroy my heart. So, I am not ready.

No one is alone on their journey; we all share the common path of inner fragmentation, failure, longing, and seeking. It is easy to seek in the wrong place. I have done it many times, and still fail. It is the fear of pain that keeps me back from fully abandoning myself into the arms of our loving God, yet I am pursued. The lover of my soul will not let go of me. I do not understand but embrace this truth.

Trust is not an easy path, since in to trust I have to face my own lack of self-love, which blocks trust. It is when the struggle is strong that I gain the inner freedom to truly trust, no matter the inner pain of my soul. We are all carried, brought into the very heart of God. Catholics call this the ‘The Sacred Heart of Jesus’. It is a reality, for in all our suffering, God suffers with us, that is the price of love. Ask any loving parent, or friend, or brother or sister.-Br.MD