One of the telling things about being a Christian, no matter how new the claim might be, is a newfound understanding and appreciation of being by yourself. I don’t mean being lonely or anything. I mean being alone with the Lord.
Some might call it prayer, others meditation. You can in call it what you want to, but being alone with God is a whole lot different than being alone without God. Understanding this reality once you’ve accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior can take some getting used to. Many of us, including yours truly, at times have great difficulty dealing with self. We can find countless things to do with alone time on our hands; lights get turned on, channel surfing starts, music blasts, people get called and shopping gets done.
We aren’t comfortable with who we really are. It might be fear. It might be shame. It could even be embarrassment. All of this and more comes into play when circumstances force us to look back over our own lives without external interference or internal rationalizations. That deafening silence we’re afraid of is filled with the rather loud volume of truth.
The closer you get to accepting the Lord’s call upon you, the more you come to understand that facing up to your inner demons is required learning; you can’t escape, you can’t hide. Coming to grips with one’s sinful past is a prerequisite for all future relationships and some you’re in right now, particularly the one with Jesus Christ.
It’s that “truth will set you free” stuff. The peace of reconciliation with one’s self begins and ends with the unadulterated truth that nothing can stand between you and the God who loves you; not your pride or ego, not your insecurity, not your sinful nature, not your clouded view of who you think you really are.
If God’s in the picture, it’s just you and Him. And He accepts no substitutes for you; no pretenders, gamesters, no pretense or facades. After all, He knows your essence and that’s what He wants. It’s actually what He demands.
But isn’t that the beauty of what He offers all of us? Isn’t it His essence that we actually seek? Before you attempt to answer with “yes,” understand that “yes” means you will never be alone again, in life or in death.
You better get used to the man or woman in the mirror. That is exactly who God made and whom He loves, warts and all. Now you can fill those otherwise lonely moments with the truth that you are surrounded by the ever-present crowd of One.Â
