Experience has shown me that looking forward to something is often better than actually getting it. If you’re thinking this is a cynical way of looking at life, bear with me for a second. Think about it.
Spring Break is always this way. What seems to promise unlimited potential—an entire seven days to shoot hoops, read my own books, spend time with Lindsay, camp out, sleep—ends up delivering a near-lethal blow to the academic rhythm. After a week of the ‘good life’ (which may or may not include sunny skies) it usually takes me the rest of the semester to get back on track. If I’m lucky, I get my act together just in time for finals.
Ballyhooed events are often like this too. The summer’s big movie or the NCAA basketball championship are so highly anticipated that the real thing can’t live up. (Unless the film involves Spiderman or the NCAA game is in 1988.)
I’ll cut the examples short, but all kinds of things in life are better before they happen. Anticipation knows no limits. Reality is all too concrete—and the final dimensions aren’t as soaring as I pictured them.
Of course, life being what it is, something does have to happen. I’m definitely not saying that I’d prefer to sit in an empty room anticipating what a non-monotonous life might be like. I like happenings as much as the next guy. I’m a big fan of things taking place.
I am going somewhere with this. But in order to keep you from laughing at me in a condescending way, I’ll insert a C.S. Lewis quote here. Consider what he said in Mere Christianity:Most people, if they had really learned to look into their own hearts, would know that they do want, and want acutely, something that cannot be had in this world. There are all sorts of things in this world that offer to give it to you, but they never quite keep their promise. The longings which arise in us when we first fall in love, or first think of some foreign country, or first take up some subject that excites us, are longings which no marriage, no travel, no learning, can really satisfy… There was something we grasped at, I that first moment of longing, which just fades away in the reality. I think everyone knows what I mean. The wife may be a good wife, and the hotels and the scenery may have been excellent, and chemistry may be a very interesting job: but something has evaded us.
In his autobiography, Lewis speaks at length about “an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction. I call it Joy.” Man, does he nail it.
The upshot is that in this life the longing or anticipation for a desired thing may often bring us nearer to heaven than our experiencing of the thing itself. To me this fact seems very close to the heart of bittersweetness.
It’s for this reason that I don't feel bad about admitting that all the desires that life awakens in me are by no means satisfied. I’m not even sure that they will be, given the scope of the next fifty years. It seems unlikely, really. But given the scope of eternity—that’s a different question.
When the lines of the picture have been expanded and drawn back, pulled back so far that I can no longer even imagine the “boundaries” (if such a word has meaning in heaven), I am not at all concerned that my imagination will get the better of me and heaven will prove a disappointment.
The unfulfilled longings are OK for now, is what I’m saying. They may hurt but I don’t grudge them their place, because they’re strangely sweet. Heaven will be unspeakably better than here. How, and to what extent?
I’ve given it some thought, and I find great satisfaction in knowing that no matter how vivid my anticipations, they will be no more than a speck of paint on the unimaginable canvas of eternity. Joy may sting a little now. But heaven is the one reality that defies all anticipation, that is always “better than—.”
Christ says that's where I'm headed.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Unsatisfied Desires for Heaven
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7 comments:
You're right. I wouldn't say everything anticipated is better than when attained. Nonetheless, our expectations are rarely met. I've discovered that true pleasure appears at random. We just need to learn to be ready.
Cheers.
Indeed, the joy of our reunion with our Father will be the singular event in which the occurrence will substantially surpass any level of anticipation we might have.
I have found it true for a long time that anticipating is better than reality. Possibly the meeting God/heaven moment will transcend this because you really don't know what to expect and are not able to imagine it fully enough to script it out and have it disappoint. Just a guess. As you know, I am a non-believer.
The assistant pastor of my church often tells the story of his honeymoon. Although I do not remember where he went, it was apparently idyllic. He was sitting outside on a warm sunny day at the beach with his new wife when it struck him, "This is so good, but I want so much more." Fortunately, his wife clearly understood his meaning. He recently had a baby and still feels, despite the overwhelming joy, just the same.
Thanks, all. Your comments dispel some of the (slight) uneasiness I felt at posting on this topic. Not that I mind being accused of cynicism... ;)
One upshot of these observations: Anticipation of good things can be freely indulged in, even knowing (or at least suspecting) that the actual experience won't quite match up. Because they point heavenward, the feelings of bittersweet expectation are still legit and good. Even worth pursuing...
Paula, I admire the fact that you have something to say on this topic as a non-believer. Your hypothesis makes a lot of sense. I'd modify it by saying that even if I did know precisely what heaven would be like, the expectation wouldn't disappoint. This makes heaven unique on several counts...
I'd also note that Christians can't waffle on the reality of heaven. Paul says it outright: "If we have believed in Christ for this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied." In other words, the afterlife must be more than a pleasant idea, or my life should go down as a silly one-liner in the history books... We bank a lot (everything, really) on Christ's promise that this life is not the sum total of things.
OC, that story is perfect. Good thing the guy's wife "clearly understood his meaning" - quite an accomplishment on the honeymoon!
Ariel, I also love what Lewis says about our stay here. That it is not intended to be what satisfies. Yes, our Father indulges us in nice little hotels, dance, nice food and other things that make our journey pleasurable, but it is not intended to usurp what is to come, or even compare. I'm paraphrasing here, yes, but I assume you understand the meaning!
I think it is simulatneously a relief and a frustration to grasp that this life is bittersweet. It is wonderful, and lacking, at the same time. That the "isn't there something else?" is because there is. And that all we long for cannot be met in even the most incredible parts of our blessing here, our spouses, our children.
Thanks for touching on this, it is a mystery, and so clear at the same time!
"It is wonderful and lacking at the same time."
Yeah, I think that's it exactly. I suspect that we miss out on the wonder sometimes because we fail to realize that by necessity the picture is incomplete. We are mistaking fragments for the whole, and then missing the bittersweet joy the fragments might have given us.
Well said, Captain.
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