Living and Yearning

“If you want to build a ship, don’t summon people to buy wood, prepare tools, distribute jobs, and organize the work, rather teach people the yearning for the wide, boundless ocean”.

For too long the church has attempted to build ships (the methods of ministry) before they have adequately learned to yearn for the wide, boundless ocean ( the vision of the God's kingdom).

Dallas Willard in The Divine Conspiracy points out that Jesus' eyes envisioned a God-bathed, God-permeated world. Chapter three of Willard's classic is worth the price of the book, and is a must read for any Christian who is serious about following Jesus. There is little doubt that Jesus' craving to sail the high seas of His father's kingdom was insatiable desire that drove all that he said and did. With such a desire, building the ship sort of becomes a natural process.

Perhaps our greatest task in spiritual formation is to bring people back to that place of yearning for the wide, boundless ocean. The current problem in most churches is one of vision. I've seen folks be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit, beginning to catch Jesus' vision of the kingdom, only to be encouraged by the church “to buy wood, prepare tools and distribute jobs”.

As a result, ship building becomes more of an obligation than a delightful joy.
We must give attention within our churches to re-imagining what God's own life is like, and then just set there for a while and bask in the reality of His vastness and goodness and justness and love.

We must recognize how indispensible this yearning. . .this ferocious desire to explore the vast, boundless ocean is. Everything begins and ends here.

So how badly are you craving it?