Pray Amarillo

Jesus looks for a very specific response from us as His friends during this time. He searches for hearts that mourn and long and fast for Him as an expression of our friendship and intimacy with Him. He seeks those who cannot live as though things are all right in His absence, but rather yearn continually for His second coming. This mourning for Him and longing for His coming are produced by our growing in the knowledge of Him-the antidote that turns us from the error of a scoffing, unbelieving attitude and yields us to the assurance of all His promises (2Peter3:17-18). Jesus wants the intensification of our passion and desire for Him to culminate into living blamelessly in holy love before Him. This is what He searches for even now, and this is our part to play in the great story unfolding.
Attentive to our every decision and our every word, Jesus desires friendship on earth. He looks for a collective Bride that does not just pay lip service to Him, occasionally sprinkling His name into their language or claiming belief in Him according to convenience. He looks for those who live as though things are actually as they are-as though the Bridegroom that we love and will soon marry is away right now.
Though He has given us the Holy Spirit and we know the consolation of His indwelling presence, and though He has given us His Word and we know that which He has promised and spoken to us, the actual Person is not here in the flesh. We can’t touch Him; we can’t see Him with our eyes or hear Him with His own voice. Every day is a waiting, a preparing, and an anticipating of His most longed for coming again. For things to go on as they are is not okay. John Piper states, “The Bridegroom left on a journey just before the wedding, and the Bride cannot act as if things are normal. If she loves Him, she will ache for His return”.