“I have climbed the highest mountains
I have run through the fields
Only to be with you
Only to be with you
I have run, I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for”
Bono
I can remember how I felt when I first started listening to U2’s hit song, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.” My whole body wanted to move, to run a marathon, with my bedroom door as the start line. The rhythm seemed to enter me and pull me out into a flowing current. Is this not what worship is all about?
Looking back now, I see it as my first introduction to this sacred longing within me for adventure.
This song has been declared as an anthem of doubt, restlessness, and searching. A hymn for the seekers, the pioneers, the runners. However, for so many of us we’ve been told those very things need to eventually come to an end. We’ve been criticized for our endless wanderings, seemingly purposeless pilgrimages, and persistent, disturbing questions.
We’ve told ourselves we should probably consider crossing the finish line on doubt, putting reins on our wild spirit, and eventually stopping our search.
There’s been seasons of my life where I’ve aligned to these sorts of stances and beliefs, and they were comforting to be sure. My faith was filled with certainty. My life mission felt set in stone. The Good Book was inerrant, and the canon was closed.
Standing on solid ground definitely feels safe.
And don’t we all like people who are solid? The ones who are strong, stable, reliable, and dependable. Unshakable.
But lest we forget solid also describes an impenetrable brick wall, a block of ice, a cement path, a hard, heavy rock?
I haven’t counted exactly, but I’ve moved approximately every two years since I was eighteen, several of those relocations to other countries.
I am familiar with what it feels like to uproot myself, the strain of packing and unpacking boxes, and selling all my belongings. I know well the practices of making new friends, learning new languages, and embedding myself in different cultures.
I’ve always felt a tad guilty for the transitioning I’ve done as a single woman and am still doing with my husband and young kids.
Do I, do we, have some weird addiction to adventure?
Perhaps we do.
But you won’t hear me apologizing for it any longer.
Everyone one of us is suffering on some level from movement deprivation. Spiritual, physical, you name it.
You might be getting hints of it through my writing these past few months. My husband and I have been taking our faith out of its tight wrapping, giving it back its legs to run wild, letting it breathe, and giving it space to flow more freely. All of this has been a process of course, ten years at least, if not more.
The fluidity- the swaying and rocking, the rushing and swooshing- can be bewildering at times. The river appearing dangerous at first. Won’t we get sucked under, will we ever be able to come back, how will it lead us?
We have grown arthritic, forgotten our elasticity.
But the springs have always been there, on the inside, meant to be spilling up and over the banks. Our bodies 60% water, our design undeniable. Even God Himself is known as the Living Water.
The real danger lies then in refusing to budge on certain beliefs, constructing sanctuaries to contain the spirit, and defining home as settling down within four walls.
What would it take for us to join in with the rock and roll hymn? To linger awhile like Bono does on that word still? To consider our run isn’t over, the movement is only beginning, and this is exactly where we need to stay?
