| by
Gretchen Jones
Imagine leaving your job, your family members, your
friends, and your belongings to move to a place that
was unfamiliar – to a place where you couldn’t
speak the language and you only knew acquaintances but
had no real friends. Imagine exchanging the known for
the unknown, the controlled for the out-of-control.
By doing exactly this over 5 years ago, I was choosing
to walk down a path of obedience, but it was not necessarily
easy! Before I ever left my home in the US, God challenged
me by saying that even if I experienced 365 difficult
days, I was still called to move to Peru. Of course,
I knew that I was more than likely to experience difficult
days in that first year and was bound to feel more alone
than I ever had before.
How many of you are comfortable with being alone? How
do you respond to being alone? To feeling alone? Through
my move to Peru, I accepted a position of aloneness.
God had called me there. Looking back, I realize that
I had to walk through a time of aloneness in order to
receive the blessing of community. We would rarely like
to admit that. When we recognize we are physically alone,
we often scramble to change our circumstances as quickly
as possible. We think it is wrong to be alone, causing
us to wonder if we took a wrong turn and we must find
the road the leads back to lots of people and lots of
busyness. However, God has a purpose in aloneness in
your life and in mine.
There have been seasons in my life in which I have found
myself without a lot of spiritual companions around
me. I have had a season of very few Christian friends,
a season of grief which few could relate to, and even
a season of feeling extremely alone despite being in
a large group of people. These were times when I could
have easily grown resentful, jealous and bitter. Instead
I had to surrender my desires and accept God’s
handiwork in my life.
When I think of others who are in a position of aloneness,
one of the first that comes to mind is a particular
woman that Jesus encountered. In Luke 7, we see Jesus
entering the gates of the city of Nain (Luke 7:11),
accompanied by his disciples and a large crowd of followers.
They were surely rejoicing over the recent healing of
the Centurion’s servant (Luke 7:10). Christ exclaimed
that, “not even in Israel” had he “found
such great faith” when He spoke of the Centurion
(Luke 7:9).
Jesus was moved to compassion when He saw the body of
a dead man being carried out of the city. The man was
the only son of his mother, who was already a widow.
Sure, she was also accompanied by a crowd from the city
of Nain, but, I imagine she was pondering what life
would be like after having lost her husband and now
her only son. She was likely wondering how it would
feel to be that alone. Jesus was moved to compassion
for this woman and He restored life to the dead man
after he touched the coffin and spoke, “Young
man, I say to you, arise!” (Luke 7:14)
For me, this is a reminder that God cares about our
aloneness. He cares enough to have compassion. He cares
enough to stop, touch and speak. He cares enough to
restore. I have not lost a husband, or a son, but I
have experienced losses and loneliness in my life. There
have been times I have truly been alone and times I
have felt incredibly alone. It was at those times I
see God truly had compassion on me and in a sense, brought
me back to life.
So why would God allow us to go through seasons of being
alone and feeling alone? Why is it something we try
so hard to avoid? Do we truly understand aloneness to
be something that can truly bless us in our relationship
and walk with Christ? When others are taken from our
life, we find ourselves relying on, trusting in and
drawing close to God all the more. The more time we
spend with someone, the deeper we grow in our relationship
with them and the more we become like them. A great
example of this is found in the friendships we have.
The more time spent with a best friend tends to deepen
the friendship and often we grow to be similar as we
spend more time with that person.
When things are taken from our lives we learn to treasure
what remains. We know this to be true when we experience
the loss of a loved one, the end of a relationship or
a dashed hope. Once we move past the grief of what is
lost, we see the value of what remains. When I visited
Peru for the very first time, I was struck by how brown
Lima looked to me. I had been warned that since Lima
is technically in the desert, there was very little
green and no flowers grew. For the last several years,
I have learned to appreciate small gardens, green parks
and the solitary flower I see in front of a home. I
have learned to cherish what does exist instead longing
for what doesn’t. God also wants us to take time
to count our blessings and thank him for the people
He has placed in our lives.
Through the times of walking alone, we learn to trust
God in a greater way. He is fully aware of our needs
and always provides for us in ways that teach us. The
words of the song by Matt Redman (Album: Where Angels
Fear To Tread, 2002), “Blessed Be Your Name”
ring true to this fact.
“You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name”
We must cling to the truth that even the people around
us are a gift from God. He is the One who has given
them to us. But He is also One who can take them away.
When our trust is in God, we learn that He chooses who
comes in and out of our lives. It becomes less and less
about us and more and more about Him. I have had some
very special friends in my life who have helped me through
difficult times as well as shared joyous times with
me. But, some of those very same friends have grown
distant. Of course, I long for the times they were close
to me, but I have to trust that God has allowed for
the distance and that He will provide others in a time
of need. I choose to trust God and His gifts of companionship
and friendship instead of the people themselves.
The widow of Nain was not the only person to be alone
in the Bible. Several others experienced aloneness and
several did so by their own choice. Daniel was taken
from his family in Jerusalem at a young age and was
forced into training and education by a foreign people
who worshipped other gods (Daniel 1:1-7). He responded
to difficult situations by taking time alone to spend
time in prayer (Daniel 2:18, 6:10) and did not always
seek out the comfort and advice of spiritual companions.
Who do you turn to when you are faced with difficult
circumstances?
Being alone is something Jesus sought after in order
to spend time in fellowship with the Father. Before
He made decisions regarding those who would accompany
Him as disciples, Jesus went off to the mountain to
pray, He spent the whole night in prayer there (Luke
6:12). After the feeding of the 5,000 Jesus withdrew
again to the mountain by Himself to pray (Matthew 14:23,
Mark 6:46, John 6:15). He had tried to get away before
this event, but the multitudes followed him (Luke 8:10).
Although He took a few of the disciples along with Him
to the Garden of Gethsemane, He asked them to remain
at a distance and keep watch while He went a little
beyond them to pray (Matthew 26:39, Luke 22:41). Jesus
was teaching us by example that we must have time alone
with God in order to commune with Him, especially during
crucial moments. Who do you seek when you must make
difficult decisions?
Other examples include Hagar was run out of her home
by Sarai and was found sitting alone by an angel who
encouraged her (Genesis 16:6-7). Moses was exhorted
by his father-in-law, Jethro, for taking on a task that
was too heavy for him and that he should not be judging
all the people alone (Exodus 18:13-26). As well, prophets
such as Jonah (Jonah 4:1-5) and Elijah (1 King 19:4)
found themselves alone after times of great ministry,
although their desire was that of isolation, not necessarily
because they were seeking God. What type of refuge do
you look for when you are worn out and discouraged?
When we find ourselves alone, we often rush to find
a way to fill in the silence. We make a phone call,
turn on the television, check the internet, and hit
the stores. We will often do anything to avoid time
to be by ourselves. This desire often becomes stronger
when we come face to face with life’s challenges
or tough decisions. Our first instinct is to turn to
someone here on Earth, yet it is typically those times
He has purposed to draw us closer to Him. Use the opportunity
to draw close to God as Jesus did, and trust that He
will provide spiritual counselors here on Earth if He
chooses to do so.
Although you may desire for God to provide counselors
and advisers for you, you may not recognize any here
on Earth. Christ was aware of our human desire to not
feel alone and abandoned. John records the words Christ
spoke as He was preparing for His own death. Knowing
that He would no longer be present with the disciples
and other followers, Christ reassured them by promising
that the Holy Spirit was to come and would be with believers
forever (John 14:16). The Spirit was to come to abide
with and in us (John 14:17). The Spirit was to act as
our teacher (John 14:16) and our guide into all truth
(John 16:13). He did not want us to feel abandoned as
orphans (John 14:18). The Spirit is with us, in us,
and He will guide us into all truth. When it appears
that others are not around, the Spirit is there counseling,
teaching and guiding.
There is a difference between being alone and feeling
alone. There is a difference between drawing close to
God and running away from people. Community and fellowship
do not exist so we can grow to depend on them but they
exist so we can grow within them. In His time, God will
call you from the position of aloneness into part of
a community – maybe into a physical community,
maybe a spiritual community. This may mean taking a
risk by joining a small group, meeting with someone
one on one, or simply expressing that you have a need
to be included. These things are not easy, nor are they
comfortable. But when God points us in a direction of
community we must embrace it.
As long as you are in a position of aloneness, be reminded
that you can trust your Father and Lord to be everything
you need and to provide everything that you need. He
is aware of your deepest longing and is also aware of
your need to grow and to be strengthened in your areas
of weakness. Be thankful for friends and counselors
that God has provided, whether or not they are presently
in your life. The position of aloneness is for a season
and just as each season brings forth growth of different
kinds, the aloneness you feel today will bear the fruit
of trust and thankfulness tomorrow.
Works Cited:
* All scriptures used unless otherwise noted are taken
from the NIV translation. |
