In 1987 the Irish band U2 produced a popular song, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.” It is a song about searching for faith. God is not explicitly mentioned, but it doesn’t take much insight to interpret the song as a longing for a relationship with God. The last lines of the song are:
You broke the bonds and you
Loosed the chains
Carried the cross
Of my shame
Of my shame
You know I believed it
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for
But I still haven’t found what I’m looking for…(U2, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For,” from the album, The Joshua Tree, ©1987).
Bono sings that he “believes” that “you carried the cross.” This is a clear reference to Jesus and how he frees us from sin and shame, especially in the context of the rest of the song. What is noteworthy, though, is that even though the singer “believes,” he still hasn’t found what he’s looking for. Believing – at least in the sense of acknowledging something to be true – isn’t enough. God is not a statement or a formula that we acknowledge as true. God is a Person with whom we long to have a relationship. Until we grow in that relationship with God, until we experience God’s love for us and love God back, we’ll continue to say, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.”
In the first chapter of John’s gospel, some of John the Baptist’s disciples start to follow Jesus – I mean that literally, they start to walk behind him. Jesus turns and asks them, “What are you looking for?” They respond, “Where are you staying?” It seems to me that they already in some sense “believed” that Jesus was the Messiah when they started walking, even if their idea of who the Messiah was and what the Messiah would do were radically different from Jesus’ plans. But they knew on some level that acknowledging that Jesus was the Messiah or even knowing his plans was not the most important thing. Knowing Jesus, having a relationship with Jesus, was the most important thing. So they asked, “Where are you staying?” The implied questions were “Can we come with you? Can we stay with you? Can we be with you?” Jesus answered, “Come and see.”
We can know a lot about God without really knowing God. You can know somebody’s address, what kind of car they drive, their Social Security number, who their friends and family are, and even what kind of TV shows they watch but not really know somebody in the sense of having a relationship with that person. There’s a big difference between knowing about God and knowing God. It’s important to know about God, to know what God has done in the past (we learn about this in the Bible), to learn what God expects of us, to learn how people have responded to God and formed relationships with him in the past. But it should not stop there. We need to get to know God if we’re really to find what we’re looking for.
St. Augustine, a really smart guy who understood a lot about God and people – and knew God and people – wrote in a prayer, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.” What he meant was that we all are looking for something. We’re all longing for something. And that something is actually a Someone – God. We need to be in a relationship with God and nothing else will really satisfy us. Of course this doesn’t mean that people can’t be happy in some real ways even if they lack a relationship with God. We all know people who don’t know God who are doing pretty well. We can find other things to fill (at least partially) that spot in our hearts that longs for God. But the other people in our lives and the things we acquire are not really what we’re looking for. Knowing God can make a difference, a huge difference in everyone’s life.
How do we get to know God? I regret to inform you that there are not six easy steps to a deep relationship with God. Just like there are not six easy steps to a deep relationship with your spouse, your child, or your best friend. There probably aren’t even six easy steps to a good relationship with your dog. Relationships are complicated. Relationships need time to mature. If we want to build our relationships with God, to know God and not just know about God, there is no quick fix. We need to spend time talking to God and listening to God on a regular basis. Whatever time of day works for you also works for God. That’s the easy part. The hard part is that it’s not always easy to make the time. Sometimes it seems like God is not listening, and many times it seems that answers are not coming. Most of the time, God doesn’t speak to us in dramatic ways. Even in the Bible, most people didn’t hear the audible voice of God. In my experience and in the experience of people I know, we most often hear God through the words of Scripture, in a sense or feeling we get that God is leading us, in words that come to us through other people, through books, through coincidences that are not really coincidences. As we spend more time talking and listening to God, we deepen that relationship and gain more of a sense of God’s love for us and care for us. It doesn’t happen overnight. It’s not always easy. But like anything worth having, a relationship with God is worth the time we put into it. God wants to have a relationship with each one of us.
We may not even know what we are looking for, and all too often, even when we know that we are looking for a deeper relationship with God, we echo U2 and admit, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for….” But we are not alone. God reaches out to us. Other believers can support us, pray for us, and even offer some guidance as we deepen our relationships with God. The good news is that it is possible to know God, to love God, and to experience God’s love for us.
It is a sad fact that we never completely find what we are looking for while we live on this earth because this world and every relationship in it is imperfect, even our relationships with God. This is true simply because we are not perfect. But even though we are lost, sinful, and inattentive, God cares about us. God calls to us. God invites us to “come and see,” and we can know God and God’s love. We can find a taste of what we’re looking for.