The Puritans, for example, were a people of fervent desire as well as rigorous discipline. It may surprise us how much they used the bold language of the Song of Songs to express their zealous passion. They spoke unashamedly of “lusting after God.” Yet the God of beauty they desired was always more than they could grasp. Hence, they wrote perpetually of their struggles with longings unfulfilled, a sense of God’s absence provoking an ever deeper yearning.
