Cross + Culture
The 7 Sayings: Longing and desire
What are we doing here?
This is a time to share and wrestle together. No one expects a quick fix or a ‘sweep it under the rug’ approach to real questions.
“Pay attention to your longings.” - Becky Grissel
Tonight, we're going to pay attention to our thirst or our longings. I'm going to guide us through this practice with questions to help us notice our longings. But first, we'll go over our ground rules, read Scripture, and then I'll share some wisdom from a book called The Holy Longing by Ronald Rolheiser.
Ground Rules
Be honest.
Be honest.
Speak in "I" statements about your own experience, not generalizations about groups of people.
Some of our thoughts or opinions may conflict with another's. Listen to understand, not to correct or convince.
Let's be more about connection than competition. This is not a space to argue who is right but to wrestle with our questions faithfully.
And please, what's shared here stays here—honor each other's vulnerability
Scripture Reading
John 19:28-30
Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, "I am thirsty." A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus' lips. When he had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
Excerpts from The Holy Longing
"It is no easy task to walk this earth and find peace. Inside of us, it would seem, something is at odds with the very rhythm of things and we are forever restless, dissatisfied, frustrated, and aching. We are so overcharged with desire that it is hard to come to simple rest. Desire is always stronger than satisfaction.”
Discussion
What does this description stir in you? Does it ring true, or does it feel too extreme?
Can you name a longing or desire in your own life that feels unquenchable—something you keep coming back to no matter what?
How do you typically respond to your own restlessness or dis-ease? Do you ignore it? Numb it? Chase after it?
Channeling Desire
Sometimes desire hits us as pain—dissatisfaction, frustration, aching. Other times, it's a deep energy, something beautiful, a pull that feels more important than anything else—a pull toward love, beauty, creativity, or a future beyond limits. This base-level drivenness is our longing. Our thirst.
And long before we do anything explicitly religious at all, we have to do something about the fire within us. What we do with that fire—how we channel it—is our spirituality.
Journaling Questions
Sometimes desire hits us as pain—dissatisfaction, frustration, aching. Other times, it's a deep energy, something beautiful, a pull that feels more important than anything else—a pull toward love, beauty, creativity, or a future beyond limits. This base-level drivenness is our longing. Our thirst.
And long before we do anything explicitly religious at all, we have to do something about the fire within us. What we do with that fire—how we channel it—is our spirituality.
Four Channels for Healthy Spirituality
Journaling Questions
Pay attention to your longings:
What are the things that drive you or keep you up at night?
What desires keep surfacing, no matter how many times you try to push them down?
Ask yourself: Why do these things matter to me? What am I really thirsting for?
Notice how you channel your desires:
What do you do with your drivenness? Where does your energy go?
Are your choices leading you toward integration (peace, connection, wholeness) or disintegration (exhaustion, isolation, fragmentation)?
Four Quadrants Exercise:
Look at these four areas of a balanced spirituality. Be honest with yourself—which are you strong in? Which are you neglecting?
Personal prayer and piety – How are you tending your relationship with God?
Social justice – How are you caring for the poor and acting on behalf of others?
Mellowness of heart – Are you resting? Enjoying life? Or always driven?
Concrete community – Do you have spiritual friendships? Are you connected?
Prayer and Commissioning
Prayer
Jesus, from the cross, you said "I thirst." You knew longing. You knew desire. You knew what it was to want and not receive.
Tonight we've paid attention to our longings—the things that drive us and the restlessness we can't shake. We've seen how we channel those longings—sometimes toward integration, sometimes toward disintegration.
Teach us to direct our desire toward you. Help us to pray, to care for the poor, to rest and enjoy life, and to stay connected to others. Make us whole. Make us integrated. Give us the grace to choose one thing—and trust that you'll meet us there.
You are the living water. Satisfy our deepest thirsts.
Amen.
Commissioning
This week, pay attention to your longings. Don't ignore them. Don't judge them. Just notice them.
Ask yourself: What am I thirsting for? And how am I channeling that thirst?Spend some time with the four quadrants. Pick one that needs attention—prayer, justice, rest, or community—and take one small step.
You don't have to balance everything perfectly. Just pay attention. And when you notice where you're dry, bring that thirst to Jesus.