of the Holy Spirit” to encourage this process.^43 According to him the “greatest gift we
can expect in this world is the Spirit of Christ” and Christ’s indwelling Spirit will
work in individuals to transform them into greater holiness so that they might
experience “dear communion with God and Christ.”^44 Further, this desire serves as a
connective tissue with the larger subject of spiritual marriage. Ambrose encourages
his readers to “desire union with Christ” and “communion with God” and further to
desire an “interest in Christs ascension into the Heaven ...[because] my Husband, my
Lord [is] in heaven.”^45 Ambrose’s language soars higher as he looks ahead and
desires the Second Coming of Christ. Amid the expectation of this joyful reunion the
object of his desire is “Christs wedding-day” and the “Marriage-Supper of the Lamb”
and hearing Jesus address God about his bride, “Father, here behold my Bride, that I
have married unto my self.”^46 As he concludes this section on desiring Christ’s return
he summarizes the richness of this longing, “[c]ome now, and run over these
particulars [of all the goals of spiritual marriage]; surely every one is motive enough
to desire this day; it is a day of refreshing.”^47 Significantly, all that Ambrose has
written about desire finds its culmination in Jesus. This is not surprising since it
echoes the title of his major work Looking unto Jesus.
Ambrose’s understanding of desire recognizes the intensity or vehemence of a
deep longing for Jesus that is reflective of both his fellow Puritans and the medieval
saints before him. A type of holy violence is required to reverse the tendency of
human corruption as well as to overcome the violence of temptations that besiege the
(^43) Ambrose, Media (^) (1657), 75. (^)
(^44) Ambrose, Looking Unto Jesus, 881.
(^45) Ambrose, Media (1657), 226, cf. 465 and Looking Unto Jesus, 213, 880, 977-8,
- 46
(^47) Ambrose, Ambrose, Looking Unto JesusLooking Unto Jesus, 1113, 1119.- 19, especially 1117-18.^