By Judy Villanueva
As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.
You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they find rest in You. (St. Augustine)
My eyes opened and I peeked out from under sleepy eyelids to see what time it was…5:00am! I should’ve gone back to sleep but all I could think of was hot, brown, yummy coffee with cream and sugar! I had awakened to the prospect of sipping a mug of “wake me up and make me happy” goodness, so drifting back to sleep was pretty unlikely. As I sat in the dark waiting for the beep that would signal “the best part of waking up,” I became acutely aware of a lacking in my hunger for God, or at least, a weakness of fervor compared to my morning passion for a cup of Joe. Yuck. I don’t want that to be true, but there it is…the whole, caffeinated truth of it.
How does the soul pant for God? We have been made for Him and even if we do not believe He exists, our souls know better!
There is a “sacred place” within us that longs for its Maker, remembers its true home, and yearns to be with God.
It is why, I believe, it matters to us that our lives have meaning. It accounts for the angst we experience when we are silent, or agree to sit still. In the spaces between moving around and being busy with this or that, we can feel our soul hunger for God. This part of us doesn’t believe for a moment that we “just happened” after a big bang, but retains the precious truth of our origins. Sadly, it is possible to ignore our soul and after a while, we can become impervious to its longing for God. I’m not sure there is anything more profoundly tragic than that a soul should forget that it belongs to God.
The image of a deer panting for water is a vivid picture of focused desire, not unlike my morning quest for coffee. “Wanting” so often is driven by habits and hungers, both real and imagined, so how do we tune into our soul’s desire for God? How do we learn to sit patiently next to Him, when everything in us wants to squirm away and fill up with temporal things?
I want to learn to follow my soul’s yearning into God’s presence and hold myself there long enough to experience His embrace.
I want to drink in the Lord more fully and not get up until my soul overflows. I need to slow myself down, linger in prayer, ponder God’s word, and savor the joy of belonging to God. His company is what I want to anticipate when I peek out from sleepy eyelids in the morning and He is what I want to fill up with each day.
“Lord, help me to pay attention to the hunger pangs of my soul and learn to want You, as I open my eyes in the morning. Call my soul to come and teach me how to enjoy Your presence more fully. Amen.”
What about you?
Did you pant for God today?
Are you aware and paying attention to your soul’s longing for God?
How do you bring your soul to God?
You have been made for God. He is your home and place of rest.
Worship
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What a beautiful way to wake up this morning to your words of Truth as I drink my morning Java!!!!! Thank you again for bringing refreshment to my soul. I love you !
Judy your message has made me think of my walk with God. I was taught love and reverence for God when I was little. I remember when I made my first communion, the love and commitment I felt for God was an emotion I have never forgotten. But Sunday Mass got tiring, and boring, and my Mother made me go. I really felt when I got married that I would leave the church, but my husband brought to my attention that if our kids were going to be raised as Catholics they could not get faith from him because he was not a believer. He wouldn’t accept the idea of our kids being dropped off at church….so I continued a walk with God that was not enthusiastic. When my kids went to college, and sought God in their ways, I decided to stop going to church, but the good Lord was having none of that. My father died, and my mother asked me to take her to church on Sundays, and I did. I made a commitment that I would go with my Mom until she died. Maybe it was because I was getting older, maybe it was a commitment to God that wasn’t as weak as I thought, or maybe I finally realized how much I needed God, especially at this stage of my life. Who but God could I call, and talk to at anytime, anyplace or anywhere? And I have made those calls. I am so relieved that God stayed with me, and didn’t give up on me.
I do pay attention to my God, everyday, at any time of the day, and I never get up in the morning without starting my day with the words “MY LORD, AND MY GOD “.