Endings and Beginnings

Classes begin tomorrow where I teach and I have mixed feelings. I'm looking forward to beginning a new semester with a new group of students. There is a tinge of excitement and anticipation at this new beginning. On the other hand, the beginning of classes means the end of the freedom to set my own schedule as I have this summer.

Every transition in life brings a mixture of anticipation and anxiety. When a new phase of life begins an old one ends. Endings often involve feelings of loss and grief over what has been lost. Of course, beginnings have a sense of excitement and adventure into the unknown.

We are always moving into an unknown future, even if we don't realize it. Nothing about our personal futures is guaranteed. We live as if life will always continue in the same way with the same comfortable routines. But life changes in an instant and we can find ourselves journeying into new territory.

What remains constant is our spiritual connection with God. This relationship endures the endings and beginnings in life and continues beyond the ending called death. This relationship offers stability, reassurance and hope-- all essentials for a fulfilling life.

Keeping Faith

In a group I regularly attend, the question was raised, "How can we keep faith?" When pressed, the person raising the question admitted that his faith in God had been undermined by the depression he was currently suffering from.

I approach the question of keeping faith by looking at a prior issue: How do you lose faith? Since faith is an act of trust, faith can be "lost" when trust is betrayed or broken. When it comes to our relationship with God, we need to be aware of our expectations of this relationship.

When God doesn't act in the way(s) we expect, we might feel deserted or abandoned by God-- especially when we're in a time of distress. When we cry out to God for help, and don't receive what we're asking for, we tend to blame God for being nonresponsive.

We need to examine our expectations of God and how God acts in our lives and world. When our expectations aren't met, perhaps it's a sign that we need to revise our expectations rather than blaming God for not responding as we asked.

When trust is lost in a relationship, it can be rebuilt. This process of rebuilding takes time and patience. If faith can be lost, it can also be found again. What is needed is a commitment to stay in the relationship and work through its challenges. This is true of our relationship with each other and our relationship with God.

Two Kinds of Knowing

The verb "to know" has two basic meanings. On the one hand there is a factual kind of knowing. In this kind of knowing we "know about" something or someone. For instance, to know about a person, we might know how tall they are, what they are wearing and the nature of their work.

A second kind of knowing is "to know" a person. In this kind of knowing, we know someone on a deeper level than factual. We know who they are-- their values, their beliefs and their expectations of our relationship with them.

This second kind of knowing is important in a loving relationship. To love someone is to know them in a deeper way. Certainly, we might love how they look and what they do. But love can also deepen so that we get to know who they truly are and receive their love in return.

These kinds of knowing/loving can be applied to our relationship with God. We might "know" that God exists and is the creator of all that is. Yet, if we are to have a close relationship with God, we need to know God in the second sense. This second way of knowing means having a spiritual connection with the holy and sacred dimension of life. In this spiritual connection, we don't only know about God, but we know God and are known by God.

The Blessing of Thirst

Psalm 42 uses thirst as a metaphor for our longing for God’s presence. It begins, “As a deer longs for flowing streams/so my soul longs for you, O God./ My soul thirsts for God,/for the living God” (42:1-2a). Our yearning for God’s presence is a kind of thirst. Although this Psalm describes the need for God’s help in a time of distress, this desire for relationship with God can come any time.

The need for relationship is one of our most basic human needs. To have a full and fulfilling life, we need the opportunity to share life and love with others. We need to know that someone will be there for us in a time of desperate need. We also need opportunities to give love as well as to receive it. All of what I’ve written in this paragraph also applies to our relationship with God.

When a relationship is broken by alienation or estrangement, we yearn for restoration and reconciliation. This is true of our human relationships and our relationship with God.

Our need to restore a broken relationship with God is so deep and intense that the word “thirst” is appropriate. We hunger and thirst for this relationship of love, forgiveness and grace. When this critical relationship is absent from our lives, our hearts long for it even more. Our thirst for God is a blessing because it leads us to seek reconciliation, only to discover that it has already been offered to us as a gift. As it says in the Beatitudes, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (Matthew 5:6).