Thirsting for more...

Jodie and I watched the Prime Time Special with Brad Pitt last night. I know, I know...I am a sell out. I found Brad Pitt's interview to be fascinating, brewing and bubbling with thirst. Here is a guy who has everything - money, fame and a pretty ex-wife. But, he seemed wrestling for something more. Most of the special focused on his work with the One organization that Bono has started to fight poverty and AIDs in Africa. Brad's anxiety and wrestleness caused me to stop and evaluate my own heart. My own quest for peace, my endless struggle with being without rest and my own sadness. I have been reading Augustine's Confession. Besides the book being more wordy then I am...it's awesome!! I had to read it in seminary but never took time to listen to Augustine. I never realized the courage he mustered to tell his story - a story of brokeness and redemption. On the back cover of the book one quote is printed and it goes like this:

"You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, you put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after you. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you. You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours."

A man who tasted and longed for Christ. A man who sought his life to know God's peace. As I think about my own life, I am the stereotypical pomo adult. I am self absorbed, some times aloof, filled with anxiety and cyncism. I long for those layers of self-protection to be melted away by the One who has touched me.

What I love about the book is that he can't keep from coming back to Jesus because he is beautiful, satisfying and larger then Augustine's problems and unrest. Augustine's God cannot be controlled and boxed. But, he also isn't a God who is a loof or distant. I need to be reminded again, I need my heart to be stirred and wooed by the goodness of recreation. I need to be called again and again to the new story He has made for me. The new story I am a part of even though I forget about it.
Jeff