There are some decisions that will make us die a little each time. So why do we still choose to make them?
Why do we still decide to ride on the bus that travels along the road of acceptance?
Why do we still follow after the success trail to exhaustion?
Why do we still go after unrequited love?
Why do we still greed after more?
There are many “why’s” in the world. I have no answers but we can agree on one thing. The answers are not what we are looking for. When we ask these questions, it is not because we are looking for the answers; we are simply longing for satisfaction.
The satisfaction of friendship and love without conditions.
The satisfaction of being chosen and feeling special.
The satisfaction of knowing that whatever I do matters to somebody.
The satisfaction of knowing that I am part of something important.
Man cannot exist in a vacuum; but man has a vacuum.
And until we find what that vacuum is all about, it can never be filled.
Augustine concluded, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
How old we are this year counts the number of times we have gone through the Lenten season; the number of years we have gone through Easter Sunday. But has it really touched our core?
It is to fill this vacuum that Resurrection has been given.
Because it is not simply the feeling of love we are after. Nor is it only life’s purpose we are longing to discover; it is really love that brings purpose.
As the famed dialogue goes in the movie As Good as it Gets:
Melvin Udall: I’ve got a really great compliment for you, and it’s true.
Carol Connelly: I’m so afraid you’re about to say something awful.
Melvin Udall: Don’t be pessimistic, it’s not your style. Okay, here I go: Clearly, a mistake. I’ve got this, what – ailment? My doctor, a shrink that I used to go to all the time, he says that in 50 or 60 percent of the cases, a pill really helps. I *hate* pills, very dangerous thing, pills. Hate. I’m using the word “hate” here, about pills. Hate. My compliment is that night when you came over and told me that you would never… all right, well, you were there, you know what you said. Well, my compliment to you is, the next morning, I started taking the pills.
Carol Connelly: I don’t quite get how that’s a compliment for me.
Melvin Udall: You make me want to be a better man.
Being loved gives us the purpose and satisfaction of wanting to become a better man.
If it doesn’t, then maybe we haven’t gotten the memo yet … the memo on satisfaction and longing.
The memo of how one man decided to lay down everything so that ours could really count for good.
