Where Else Would I Go?

My wife and I arrived home yesterday evening (12/31/2024) after nine days and over 450 miles of crisscross holiday travel throughout Tennessee. Those nine days consisted of early mornings in a tree stand and duck blind, mid-day naps, evening dinners with family, and late nights of laughter and catching up with those we hold dearest. This stretch of days between Christmas and New Year’s Day is always cherished, but the sweetness of returning home brings a welcomed exhale after so many days on the road. 

Last night as I laid in bed and listened to the neighborhood fireworks ring in the New Year, I thought a lot about what 2025 might bring. This past year has been one of great spiritual, professional, and relational growth for both my wife and I. Will this new year bring the same? 

As I closed my eyes to sleep, I thought about the prayers I prayed through 2024 and pondered how God has handled them. Through the last year I prayed for many things, but one prayer seems to have been answered in the affirmative time and time again, “Lord, would you give me a deeper longing for Christ?” However, I didn’t always understand the response this request would yield, nor did I expect the pains it would bring. 

There were many times through 2024 that felt like I was not moving. It seemed that life was not progressing or developing in the ways that I expected. Am I doing enough? Am I where I am supposed to be? Why does it feel as if there is always something missing? Why do I feel this burning in my chest to do something more? Why does it feel like I am running out of time? These questions followed me closely in 2024. 

Through all of the joys, stresses, disappointments, and successes of the last year I have been accompanied by an ever growing hunger for something more. I have prayed for the Lord to reveal himself to me, to draw me closer, deeper, and further into His will for my life. Was the fruit of my days reflective of these prayers? It didn’t always feel like it. When I prayed for a deeper longing for Christ I expected it to feel something like this: 

• slow and easy mornings in the Word

• fluent and coherent prayers that leave the tongue lightly 

• an increase of mental clarity 

• easy dealings with work, family, and life in general

I might not have admitted it at the time, but there were moments in 2024 when I prayed for a deeper longing for Jesus, but what I really wanted was for things to just be easier. At times I had convinced myself that those were the same thing or that the former would lead to the latter. I believe my cry to long deeper was a genuine prayer to be nearer to my God. I believe my heart desired the right thing in asking for more of my dear Savior, but my expectations of what it would feel like were misguided, or perhaps just naive. 

To long is to hunger, to crave, to earnestly desire. In other words, to long is to feel pain in expectation. When I prayed to long for Christ, I wished that longing would bring a sense of ease. If I learned anything in 2024 it was that to long for Christ actually feels more like this: 

• homesickness for somewhere I have never been

• a lack of satisfaction in the comforts of this world

• a growing burden for lost souls

• earnestly reading Scripture and wrestling to understand it 

• lonely songs of praise that no one else will ever hear

• struggling to articulate the hunger pains deep in your soul…

Perhaps, over the last year when I felt that I wasn’t where I needed to be or when I feared I was running out of time I was simply experiencing the growling of a hungry soul wanting more Jesus. I feared in those moments that I was falling further behind or somehow slipping through the grasp of his will for me. Now I think I know better. He was giving me what I asked for… a deeper longing, a growing pain for the sake of knowing him further. Every discomfort, every sense of fear or doubt that took place in the past year forced me to turn my eyes to him. Isn’t that what longing should look and feel like, turning our eyes toward Jesus?

In all the hunger pains of longing for my Jesus I have still somehow found a persistent peace, a satisfying comfort, fullness of purpose, and abounding love. When I feel I am not where I am supposed to be, it is then that I am reminded of where I will one day be, by his side, in glory. When I feel that I am running out of time as the years speed by at an alarming rate, I nervously look to my God and I am calmed when he assures me that every second of my little life is accounted for in his hand. 

To long is to look, so if I long for Christ, then I will look to him the same and find all peace and assurance that I am his and he is mine. In Christ, to long is to be comforted, despite all our present discomfort in this world. In him, to long is to be filled. 

I began 2025 by reading a few chapters from the book of John. He was a man, no doubt, who longed for Christ. He spent years by his side and watched him be crucified, resurrected, and then saw him ascend back to Heaven. He spent the following years participating in the growth of the church and witnessed the increased persecution it brought to his fellow brothers and sisters. He experienced his own persecution and lived to see the death of his fellow apostles who were killed because of their allegiance to Christ. We have every reason to believe that, unlike most of the apostles, John lived into old age and it both encourages and sobers me to think of all the time he spent longing to be with the man who changed his life forever. 

This morning as I was reading, I came across an interaction John recounts between Jesus and his disciples in John 6:66-69:

“66 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. 67 So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” 68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

Despite all the hard teachings of Christ and many of his disciples turning back to leave him, the twelve answered Jesus by saying, “Where else would we go?”

That is my prayer for 2025. That in the midst of all the lingering struggles from the previous year and the hopes of a new one that I would come and kneel before my Lord and say, “where else would I go?” 

Where else would I go to find that which my heart longs for? Where else would I go to find peace, forgiveness, grace, and belonging? Where else would I go to find my purpose? Where else would I go to find my life? 

Lord, in 2024 I prayed for a greater longing for Christ. You answered that prayer by showering upon me a hunger that only you can satiate. Every time I felt out of place it was to remind me to look to you to find my belonging. I am grateful for the hunger pains that accompany my longing for Christ because when life gets hard and faith is an uphill climb I now have my answer when you ask, “Do you want to go away as well?”. 

Lord, let I be among those who would desperately say with authentic love, “Where else would I go? You have the words of life.”

There is nothing else in this life that can satisfy my soul. I still long for you Jesus. Would you increase that longing in this new year again? You are my life and all its fullness. I want to be nearer to you, Lord. I want to want you more this year. I want to feel hungry for and filled by your love. All this is found in Jesus Christ, my Lord.

Where else would I go?