Longing

Emmett stopped listening to music when he got sick, especially new music.  I think it caused him too much grief.  I remember coming home from work about a month before he died and hearing worship music playing loudly from the bedroom.  My heart surged with joy, and I thought maybe, just maybe, he had broken through some of the sadness.   But when I got back to our room, I discovered that he was going through songs and making notes in a red spiral notebook, "you know, just in case," I remember him saying.  He was choosing the songs we would sing at his memorial service.

I still haven't brought myself to touch his computer, which contains our entire music library, so I've been limited to a few CDs in my car and the disks I've downloaded since he died with some helpful supplements from friends.  Emmett used to sort through music with ease, pulling out what I'd like and passing it along with stunning precision.  I, on the other hand, find wading through the vast realms of music to find what I like about as fun as most people find calculus.  So when I recalled a couple disks that Emmett had wanted us to get before he got sick, I figured it was a pretty easy way to find music I liked.  I downloaded a couple Snow Patrol albums, and found this little gem.

New York by Snow Patrol

If you were here beside me
Instead of in New York
If the curve of you was curved on me
I’d tell you that I loved you
Before I even knew you
Cause I loved the simple thought of you 

If our hearts are never broken
Well there’s no joy in the mending
There’s so much this hurt can teach us both
Though there’s distance and there’s silence
Your words have never left me
They’re the prayer that I say every day. 

Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here 

The long neon lights
And the eek of the ocean
And the fire that was starting to spark
I miss it all, from the love to the lightning,
And the lack of it snaps me in two 

If you were here beside me
Instead of in New York
Of the arms you said you'd never leave
I'd tell you that it's simple
And it was only ever thus
There is nowhere else that I belong 

Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here
Come on, come out, come here, come here 

The lone neon lights
And the eek of the ocean
And the fire that was starting to spark
I miss it all from the love to the lightning
And the lack of it snaps, me in two 

Just give me a sign
There’s an end and a beginning
To the quiet chaos driving me mad
The lone neon lights
And the want of the ocean
And the fire that was starting to go out.

I think this song reminds me of Emmett because it captures longing and loss very well.  I particularly like the phrase, "I miss it all from the love to the lightning, and the lack of it snaps me in two."  I mean, how much more accurate could you get when you've lost the person you love most in the world?  This song is on one of my playlists, and when it popped up this morning on the way to work, I was struck by this verse:

If our hearts are never broken
Well there’s no joy in the mending
There’s so much this hurt can teach us both
Though there’s distance and there’s silence
Your words have never left me
They’re the prayer that I say every day. 

I was reminded of one of the last things Emmett said to me before he passed away, "I wish I could tell you how much I love you."  And it occurred to me that perhaps it wasn't just Emmett saying that to me.  Doesn't God scream that same thing to me in the pages of the Bible?  When I've wondered away from him in sin, doesn't my heart cry out that I miss all of God's will, even the painful parts?  Don't misunderstand me, this song is not religious at all, but if I am the beloved of God, then the aching and longing I feel for Emmett is just a small, imperfect reflection of the aching and longing that God feels for me.  In Jeremiah 31, God says:

The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying:   “I have loved you with an everlasting love;    I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. I will build you up again,    and you, Virgin Israel, will be rebuilt. 

After 30 chapters of death and punishment and destruction, you can almost taste the longing and pleading in these words.  Isn't God trying to draw us out of our wounded, sinful natures into his wild and reckless love? Doesn't he promise to overflow our mended hearts with so much joy it borders on inappropriate?

Unfortunately, like many women spend their marriage wondering if their husband really loves them, I spend too much of my life wondering if God really loves me.  One of the things Emmett and I discussed before we got married (something we read in a book somewhere I think) is how men tend to get married and think, "score, she loves me, lets move on."  Girls on the other hand tend to think every morning, "does he still love me?"  While those are broad generalizations, I found myself referring back to that discussion often, to say, "remember that discussion?  I just need you to reaffirm that you love me right now," to which Emmett would reply, "Oh, sorry, I thought that was self-evident." I often feel like I have that conversation with God.  I flat out dread the days, weeks, and months I spend mired in sin and wallowing in self-pity, where I feel separated from God by an impossibly wide ocean, completely oblivious to how much I am loved.  So this particular line resonates with me, "Though there’s distance and there’s silence, your words have never left me.  They’re the prayer that I say every day."  Now I know that the line is really about human love, but isn't this really why I memorize scripture?  Because even though I have the Spirit of God, he often feels far away and it is so hard to remember how much he loves me.  So I find myself praying scriptures, like help me run this race with perseverance Lord, or draw me to you with your unfailing kindness.

What if we cultivated this longing for God as we cultivated our first love?  You know how when you were a teenager and liked that boy or girl and everything they did was some sort of secret message with a hidden meaning.  Or maybe that was just me, but since I teach teenagers and I'm good at eavesdropping, I'm pretty sure everyone does that, even if we don't say it out loud.  What if we read into every detail of creation the very same love that God professes for us in scripture?  What if I learned to feel his absence as deeply as I feel Emmett's?  That is my prayer for tonight, to cultivate a proper sort of longing.