Beauty stirs in us a longing for Heaven. We can appreciate the beautiful things of this world, but they don’t fully satisfy. They are merely echoes of the true, lasting kingdom. A longing for Heaven, for our “true country,” has been written on our hearts. We are, after all, image-bearers of the one who made us.

One late summer evening, I was driving along the Pacific coast as the sun was setting over the sea. It was a breathtaking sight. I decided to pull over so I could take it in. As I did so, I noticed something else. Many people—families, individuals, groups of friends—were doing the same thing. People were walking over to a grassy hill overlooking the sea to gaze at the sunset. Some were taking photos, and others were simply taking in the view. Even firemen in their large fire truck pulled to the side of the road and got out.

It struck me that all of us were gathering here, taking a moment to pause from our normal duties of the day, to stare at this beautiful scene of the sun setting over the ocean.

We all recognized the beauty of this moment. But we also knew this beautiful scene would not last forever. In a matter of minutes, the sun would set and the brilliant colors in the sky would be muted. The beautiful moment would be gone, and a part of us would be left longing for more.

Beauty stirs a longing in us. A longing for something more.

C.S. Lewis said, “Most people, if they had really learned to look into their own hearts, would know that they do want, and want acutely, something that cannot be had in this world. There are all sorts of things in this world that offer to give it to you, but they never quite keep their promise.”

He continues,

Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage.

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