Loneliness

LONELINESS........... Our "friend" when it forces us to enjoy the fellowship of God as much as we would the fellowship of others.

I remember the day I received this note card with the Loneliness verse on the front of it. It has been over twenty years ago now, my two daughters had been in a special study for about 3 months and we had been meeting in the home of another student once a week for 3 months. On the day they finished the study, they had a little celebration that afternoon and one of the girls passed out notes to all the moms. When I opened mine and saw that it said Loneliness, I thought why couldn't mine have said Blessed or Cheerfulness why did it have to say Loneliness.

Several years earlier we had left organized religion and I was still dealing with things not being the way I wanted them and one issue was loneliness. For quite some time, I had continued to pray and seek the Lord on when we were going to get planted somewhere and one morning God spoke very clearly to me through the scriptures. My eyes fell on the prayer of Moses and my eyes landed on this verse. "Through all the generations you have been our home." It has taken years for me to learn the depth of that verse but I did know enough at the time to realize we would never be going back to what I considered church.

When I first came to the Lord I was very shy and easily intimated. Whenever I had questions about scripture or a minor crises in my life my first inclination was to call someone I considered spiritual. It never entered my mind to go to the Lord first. My comfort and my security always came from someone telling me I would be ok or someone giving me their opinion on what I should do. I want to say right here that we do need each other and that God uses other people in our lives but I was totally reliant on man and not God. One day I had a minor emergency and I can remember coming home and trying to call every woman I could think of and no one was home. I finally picked up my Bible and opened it and my eyes fell to the scripture that says "Why do you consider man who's breath is in his nostrils." Once again God was showing me I was not coming to Him first. When was I going to learn!

One of the most important lessons I learned from my spiritual father was to go to God and His word. If I ever went to him with a problem he never gave me his opinion or advice. He always pointed me to God and would always say "you need to get in the Word." He already knew this and I learned this after a while that when God tells you something, it sticks. You know that it came from Him and there is no second guessing. I have gone through many trials and tribulations learning that God is my home and He is the only one who can bring peace to my soul and comfort me.

Well, it's been quite a journey as I think back of starting down the road to finding God as my home. I do cherish my friends and have such wonderful fellowship with them but I can tell you that nothing or nobody takes the place of the fellowship I have with my Father. When something arises in my life it never enters my mind to even call anyone, I'm running straight to my Daddy.

Michael W. Smith has a song that I love and it so expresses my feelings for God. It's called, Deep in Love with You.

Sitting at your feet
Is where I want to be
I'm home when I am here with you
I can't resist the tenderness of you
I'm deep in love with you Lord
My heart beats for you
Precious Jesus
Deep in love with you Lord

Humbled and amazed
That you would call my name
I never have to search again
There's a deep desire
Burning like a fire
To know you as my closest friend
I'm deep in love with you Abba Father
Deep in love you, Lord!

You'll have to listen to it. It's a beautiful song.

My little "Loneliness" note card hangs on my bulletin board in my work/office space and is a sweet reminder of my journey to finding God as my home and that Loneliness became a beautiful part of my life.