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Yearning, we all do it—whether for a new bicycle, for the phone to ring, for the healing of a break-up, or for restoration to health. Woven into this feeling is a pseudo hope, even perhaps a flight into fantasy or theft. How well I remember stealing the faux-gray suede wallet at a downtown store, related in an earlier blog.
But there’s a spiritual kind of yearning that empties the heart of the inessential, that demands reigning wayward instincts, that activates patience and discernment, and that reorients the psyche toward experiences of critical new learning.
Such leaves stretchmarks upon the psyche, hankers for the unknown that alone will satisfy, and thirsts for the unquenchable.
Old Testament texts abound with examples. Whenever yearning’s grip is too much, the waiting, too ambivalent, I turn to the psalms or the Book of Job for help: The Ancients had experienced this pull, as well, and recorded their experience.
Then you will call, and I will answer you, you will yearn for me the work of your hands, says Job to Yahweh (14:15). Such references His Unconditional love for us, and for those preparing for the physical death of their bodies, an extreme consolation.
In these Heart-whispering blogs, I’ve given way to the many faces of yearning, only to have waited out another lull with its subtle diminishment. And more purification and spiritual growth are still to come.
At 6:20 A.M., I woke with this dream:
It is evening service at the black church I’ve been attending, at the invitation of the pastor and his wife. Again, I’m greeted and enter the fellowship filled with hymns and prayer. Other than occasional constipation, I am well. The pastor, also a physician, will perform a proctologic exam in his office in the morning. Having had one before, I’m anxious.
The vibrant setting of this dream, the evening service at the black church, opens my psyche to hidden disorders that require identification and correction. The occasional constipation keeps my body/mind starved of vital nutrients, dulls my perceptions, and dumps me within the morass of sloth: Why bother?
The pastor bridges the gap between God’s presence and the worshipers in his black church: such engagement restores disorders that sludge human interactions and quickens spirits into living flames. On my own, I’m powerless to achieve the wholeness to which I aspire.
Yet, I’m anxious. Given my long-standing pride, it’s painful to admit my arrogance and willfulness, smirches upon my character for all to behold. For much of my life, pretense kept such disorders at bay; whenever aware of them, I barely nodded at their toxicity.
Since working the Twelve Steps in Recovery, however, such disclosures become frequent cries to Higher Power to effect the necessary changes. This is precisely the task of spirituality.
With the afflicted Job (10:6), I identify with his cry to God: You must search out my faults and probe after my sin. Such purification works: It’s about becoming humble and serving others.
Heart Whisperings 