We are destined to be consumed by one kind of restlessness or another, but the flames are very different. Rather the solution lies in letting our thirsts be consumed by another kind of restlessness, a higher fire, a deeper eros, God's eros. What this means is that the answer to our longing is to extend our longing, the answer to our eros is to deepen our eros, and the answer to our aching is to widen our aching. We can stew in our own fires or we can use those fires to enter the fire of God. The German poet, Goethe, in a piece entitled, The Holy Longing, suggests a couple of wonderful metaphors that can be helpful here.
Longing is meant to be a transforming mysticism within our lives.
It creates the energy for metamorphosis. For him, the desire for higher love-making was the spirit that burned inside of Jesus, the energy that motivated him and consumed, as by fire, all the more limited desires within him. He was insane for the light, on fire with God's eros, willing to die so as to be transformed and so offer the world the widest love of all, God's embrace. In Jesus, we see what it means to be redeemed from fire by fire. Advent celebrates human longing.