The Death of Potential

This week, I learned that a friend is moving away. He is moving for many good reasons such as: obedience, reconciliation, and permanency. But even with such agreeable motives, it’s hard not to feel cheated out of the potential of our friendship. There seemed to be deep waters we could navigate together in the years ahead. Or, at least, I hoped him to be such a fellow traveler.

In the past year, I said my own goodbyes to some friends I would have gladly spent my life sharing a city and my inner-world where hopes and fears reside. Even with the ability to connect through technology, there is still a big world disconnecting one friend from the other. FaceTime and Skype cannot replace a shared fire pit and drink under the same sky. Even when you must leave one place for another for reasons that make your world more whole, there are still losses you endure by saying goodbye to those who know your heart better than you. It creates loneliness in the new place where you now are supposed to breathe and grow.

This loneliness is relational. It refuses to be filled with work, comfort, or play. Instead, it demands to be saturated with soulful connections that dive past the shallows. In this new city I hope to call home for the rest of my life, this hungry loneliness is not easily satisfied. This ache is a homesickness soothed neither by a zip code nor enticing mountains to embrace. It is, instead, overwhelmed by nourishment from those who find something beautiful and familiar in the heart you slowly reveal. Here, in these relationships, are found lodgings worth traveling toward. A taste of home rich enough to request at the risk of being exposed as needy and fragile. Even those with great spouses and funny children need the shelter and sustenance of such friends. So finding such a cohort only to say goodbye after merely tasting the crumbs of the potential feast such a relationship could hold is reasonably heartbreaking. And the loneliness feels urgent once more. The place you want to call home is filled with longer shadows than before. But all of this hunger and restlessness point to a truth believers are forced to meet with a open hands.

This side of Revelation 21, we will always have a sense of loneliness and the disquiet of temporary lodging. We are not home. As long as “potential” is in our vocabulary, we will not be free from longing and grieving for friendships that seem too transient to bear. Only the new heavens and new earth colliding will remove “what might be” from our forlorn hearts. Until then, even the work of the Gospel going forward upon the lovely feet who carry it will cause longing and sorrow—even for the right reasons. Only when we experience the fullness of our relationship with Jesus, as described in Revelation 21, will potential die its rightful death. Some friendships will still be painfully ended, but tears will be wiped away . . . home will be permanent . . . and friendships will be eternal. Until then, we must say goodbye more than we should. Death and decay still make it so. Until then, even bringing reconciliation causes displacement in other areas. So come, Lord Jesus, come. I long to see You, and I know my potential good friend longs for Your eternal peace and presence as well. Jesus, you are enough, and deep friendships are an overflow of grace.

Photo: PublicDomainArchive/Pixabay

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