The Longing For That Which Is Yet Higher And Holier.

The mark of healthy spiritual life

(J.R. Miller)

"As the deer pants for the water brooks,
so my soul pants for YOU, O GOD.
My soul thirsts for GOD, for the living GOD!"
Psalm 42:1-2

Hunger is a mark of health--

and the lack of appetite proclaims

disease. The cessation of the desire

for knowledge, shows that intellectual

growth has ended.

Just so in spiritual life--

dissatisfaction is the token of health.

"Blessed are those who hunger
and thirst after righteousness."
(Matthew 5:6a)

Blessed are the unsatisfied.

Blessed are those who long

for more and more. The mark 

of healthy spiritual life, is an  

intense thirst for GOD, and a deep, 

passionate yearning for closer, 

fuller, richer, more satisfying 

communion with CHRIST HIMSELF. 

The ideal Christian life is one of 

insatiable thirst, of unquenchable 

yearning, of divine discontent--

wooed ever on by visions of an 

increase in spiritual life, new joy, 

and new attainments in Christlikeness. 

The best thing in us, is never 

what we now are, nor what 

we have already reached--

but the longing for that which 

is yet higher and holier.

"Not that I have already obtained 
all this, or have already been made 
perfect, but I press on to take hold 
of that for which CHRIST JESUS 
took hold of me. Brothers, I do not 
consider myself yet to have taken 
hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting 
what is behind and straining toward 
what is ahead, I press on toward 
the goal to win the prize for which 
God has called me heavenward in 
CHRIST JESUS." Philippians 3:12-14 

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GraceGems has published Timothy Shay Arthur's interesting article,
"The Duel".