Hello All,
(Just a general disclaimer that I must insert here at the beginning. I am but a lay person, like most of you. And these weekly “thoughts” are but my own. Not the definitive word on this or any topic. Just my own conclusions derived from my own study and faith in God. The greatest hope I have for these weekly “thoughts” is to have them be a springboard for further study on your part. Not to be a weekly treatise to be blindly accepted. So, please read them with this intent, this motive in mind).
This week’s lesson from “The Adult Sabbath School Guide” is titled “When Alone”. A good study on the “question of companionship and loneliness at the various times of life…” (Quarterly for Sabbath, April 20).
So much of our lives are spent in our own heads. Our five senses send information to our brains constantly. And constantly we are analyzing and sifting through the data to determine what information is relevant and what information to discard. We can live huge chunks of life just in our own heads. Even much of our entertainment centers on this personal, internal “mind-talk”. Think of movies, television, electronic games… all these and so many more just involve our own minds and, in many ways, present an illusion of reality. So much so, that we can actually isolate ourselves in our aloneness. Never really engaging with anyone.
The issue, of course, is our own self-centeredness… our own sin. Everything centers on ME. So this magnificent brain of ours is feeding on its own self-gratification. But this is not the purpose of our brain. The purpose of our brain is to sift through data… NOT to the benefit of self… but to the benefit of others. Here is the real issue with us and our aloneness. We can be so introspective that we lose the very ability to engage in the marvelous activity we were designed-for. That activity? To be so self-forgetful, so other-focused, that we are fully engaged in the love-work God has designed for us..
But this focus outside of our selves is not something we can generate by will-power. Because there is a vital, visceral reason we are so self-focused. The reason started long ago in the mind of Satan and was bought by Adam and Eve… and all Eve’s children ever since. The reason we are self-focused is that we all have not made God our God. We have all rejected God as God (see Romans 3:23). Therefore, if God is not God of our lives, someone must be. And that someone is us. We assume God-ship over ourselves. And this is the reason for our aloneness. It’s because we choose to be alone. We choose to be god. We choose to focus on self to the exclusion of others. And we do this because someone must have authority… and “we will not have this man to reign over us” (Luke 19:14). Hence our aloneness.
But all this changes when God becomes our authority. The moment we allow God this author-ship, all our self-focus and our desperate need for self-aggrandizement is past. Because God and His love for us meets our desperate need. Our desperate need to be loved, to belong, to have purpose, direction and meaning to our lives. Our self-focus and aloneness evaporates under the sunshine of God’s love, like the morning mist evaporates under the summer sun. Then we are free. Free to love others, free to give to others, free to focus on others, free to be what we were created to be.
Once God is our God, this marvelous brain of ours is directed in new channels. New channels of thought. No longer focused on self and self’s needs, no longer focused inward which only magnifies our aloneness. Our brains are still constantly gathering data. But not to appease self. Instead, to determine what others need. To perceive how best to reach-out and love. Our every interaction, our very lives, become a part of the grand family of the universe. Never alone again, for all are part of our family, the entire earth is our terrestrial home, and God is our Father.
Aloneness is the plight of sinful man. We seek to fill our aloneness with activity. With possessions. With careers. With anything that gratifies self and keeps us from surrendering all to our Father. Even if we keep one thing back from Him; one seemingly insignificant thing; this will keep self on the throne of our hearts and perpetuate our aloneness. Because the measure of our aloneness is contingent on the measure of our willingness to surrender to God. May we surrender all to our loving Father. For this is the remedy for all aloneness. In Him, we will never be alone again.
With brotherly love,
Jim