U2 Christmas - Week 1 - "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"

We are starting a new message series this Sunday called "U2 Christmas." For the next four weeks John's messages will be centered around the lyrics of songs from U2.

This coming Sunday the theme will be "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For." The band will be performing this song during the service as well.

I remember when U2 released "The Joshua Tree" CD. U2 was a popular band before this, but this CD propelled them to the top of the world stage. It was 1987, the year I graduated from high school - and suddenly, you couldn't turn a radio on without hearing "Where The Streets Have No Name," "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," and "With Or Without You." There was something unique and fresh to their sound back then, and even when I listen to this CD twenty years later it still sounds like something that could get released by a new band today. These songs just do not age.

"I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" is a song that explores the yearning in each of us for something greater, a restlessness for something yet unfulfilled. The final verse of the song speaks directly of Jesus when it says:

You broke the bonds and you loosed the chains
Carried the cross of my shame, of my shame
You know I believe it

And then, followed by the final chorus:

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for

As Christians, don't we believe that true fulfillment in life is found in a relationship with Jesus? How can we say we know Jesus, and in the same breath say that we still haven't found what we're looking for? This is one of the reasons I love the music of U2 - it makes you think. Is everything in our lives as we would like them to be? Is every part of our lives the way God wants them to be? Is everything in the world right and just? My eight year old is learning there are bullies in the world. I wish she didn't have to learn that - I wish there were no bullies. But don't these things stir a yearning within us? Aren't there things we are still looking for, even as followers of Christ? Not necessarily material things - but the state of things.

Are we content with the world the way it is, or do we see the potential of lives changed helping to change the lives of others through God's grace? I hope we are all still looking for that - and jumping in to make it as much a reality as possible.