Purpose within longings

I was thinking today, thinking about purpose. Like what is my purpose here on earth? I’m sure that is a question that has been asked many times, by many different people. What is my purpose? Is my purpose simply to enjoy life, to do all that I can do to make sure that my life is comfortable, or does my purpose possibly go deeper than that?

I look around me, and I see so many people. People all going for some dream, or longing for something or wishing life was different in some way, and I wonder, what is the purpose in that? I’m not saying that to have desires in life is wrong. I do not think that it is at all, I believe, in fact, that God wired us with desires. He wired us to long for things, to dream for things, to live, and to love. But I guess I just had a thought, and maybe it’s not that great of a thought, but could my purpose be found in those longings? I mean the unmet ones? My question is not if the fulfillment of those longing could help me find my purpose, but that simply the existence of those unmet longings are my purpose?

Let me try to explain. The existence of unmet longings makes me more aware of my pain. They allow me to see those things in life that I want; I long for, but maybe never will have. Now once I see that pain I have two choices; either focus on the pain and try to do everything that I can to alleviate it, or focus on God. Focus on God may seem like a cliché answer, but bear with me.

Pain, rejection, losing someone, loving, but not being loved in return, losing what you have fought for all your life, lonliness; these are some of the greatest things that cause us pain in life. But could it be that these are the things that make the greatest gift to God?  Is it possible that we can thank God for these things because they give us the opportunity to bring more glory to his name? Is there more depth to a trial then the trial itself?

Maybe, in these longings our job is not to do all that we can do to get rid of the longing, to find a solution, to fix the relationship, to get what we want. Maybe our job is simply to find out how to have joy and peace in God throughout the trial. Maybe our focus is totally wrong. I know there are things that we want, and we want them really bad, and then those things become our focus instread of God. But God has said that he is enough for us. That means that he is enough! That means that no matter how deep a longing can be in our hearts, our purpose is not to fulfull that longing, but to find God in a way that goes deeper than that longing.

I believe that the root of all of our longings in some way is God. So instead of focusing on that longing, why don’t we allow ourself to let go of the longing and focus on God? This may sound overly simplistic for those who are truly struggling with huge loss, with legitimate struggles, with pain that is unexpressable. But I believe that God can go deeper than even that. These struggles are indeed a gift from God, an opportunity to truly find Him in a deeper way. Paul stated that he learned to be content in any and every situation. That truly is a gift. Can we learn to find our contentment within our circumstances, within the places that we have that pain? Can we find our purpose in God within our longings?