Blessed Are the UnsatisfiedНамуна

The Blessing of God's Heartbeat

On the television show Undercover Boss, high-level executives go undercover in their own companies, filling the jobs of ordinary workers. They quickly find out what life is like for employees and how things really work in the trenches of their own corporations. The results are, of course, entertaining. They can also be funny, sad, poignant, and powerfully enlightening for the bosses. No amount of time in corner offices in executive suites at corporate headquarters could replace the experience of serving as frontline workers. Until they enter on equal footing and work alongside the people who work for them, they can’t truly understand how their policies and decisions affect other people. And confronted with clear evidence that changes are necessary, they care more deeply and personally than they would have cared before.

This is true on a more existential level as well. The fact that we suffer alongside everyone else in this life is ultimately good for our hearts. If we are to be known by our love, we should welcome unsatisfaction because it can help keep us tender and open toward others. Unsatisfaction reminds us we are sinners at God’s mercy, living in and among the consequences of our rebellion, just like everyone else. We long with and for our neighbors in a way we would not if we did not, like them, wish for a better world. 

Can you imagine what we would be like if God insulated us from the effects of sin and suffering in this world? If we could hide out in the spiritual equivalents of corner offices, “rising above” the problems of people around us and enjoying the perks of belonging to Christ? I fear we would not be compassionate people, eager to get our hands dirty on behalf of the rest of humanity.

God loves everyone and wants to be in relationship with every human being. God wants us to ache for those who don’t know him. God wants us to groan along with all of creation and long for its redemption. When we feel our own longing for these things, we are connected to God’s own heart.

Instead of satisfaction, life with Jesus leads us to a deeper, more righteous kind of unsatisfaction. As we know him more, we become more unsatisfied by what grieves God and hurts people (and the rest of his creation). Instead of satisfying us, he changes our longings to be more like his.