Alone

"When God gets us alone through suffering, heartbreak, temptation, disappointment, sickness, or by thwarted desires, a broken relationship, or a new friendship - when He gets us absolutely alone, and we are totally speechless, unable to ask even one question, then He begins to teach us.... Jesus cannot teach us anything until we quiet all our intellectual questions and get alone with Him." -Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, January 13.

How often am I really alone with God? Not simply by myself, but intentionally focused solely on Him? Back in college it happened all the time. There was a small prayer room that I spent countless hours in. There were periods of time where I had no roommate, and so I had the dorm or apartment completely to myself. There was a gorgeous chapel, with stained glass windows, and I would spend early mornings there, as the sun poured in through the colored glass. Those were some of the best moments of my life, times alone with God. Sometimes He would speak, sometimes He would listen, and sometimes we could just sit in silence, enjoying each other's company. It was a fantastic time, but I feel like I took it for granted.

I remember saying, like so many people did, "Life will be so much simpler once school is over. When it's just a job and not five different classes to focus on, it will be so much easier to connect with God." There are so many times since then I have wished I could go back to the simplicity of college. There have been so many times I have wished to just go sit in that prayer room at 2 AM. I have even driven down just to pray in the chapel. I miss those alone times with God. I miss the deep and intimate friendship we had.

For over four months I have found myself alone. There have been times of connecting with God, but also, and far more often, a lot of distractions that have still been allowed to consume my time. In some ways I feel that God does not care, and then I am reminded that this is part of the forging process. I have felt that He is absent, and then I am reminded of a class on the book of Job, where the professor said, "God's silence is not equivalent to God's absence."

It's amazing how even when we are alone we can still find so many things to distract us from God. Over the past four months I have learned a lot about myself. I have learned the things that make me tick, and the things that set me off. I have learned about the deepest yearnings of my heart, and by extension, the things that cause me the most pain. One of my pastors who has been walking with me this entire time had me make a list of how I feel during certain situations. From that list I was able to identify five central themes that all of the items on the list stem from. I shared them with another pastor who challenged me to combat those five things with the truth of scripture, and in doing that find out what God has to say about each of them. He then had me get a piece of paper, and at the top write "Dear Bill," at the bottom "Love, Jesus" and in between listen to what He has to say about each of these five things.

One of them was a desire for intimacy, and feeling that no one wants intimacy with me. As I looked at scripture and began to listen closely to the voice of Christ He made it clear that intimacy with Him is available, that it is something He longs for with me, but that it must be something that I desire with Him.

James 4.8 says, "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded." God says that if we draw near to Him, He will draw near to us. If we seek intimacy with Him, He will not reject us or turn us away. But intimacy requires effort on our part, cleansing through Christ, and purity through intentional focus. Intimacy with God means shutting out all distractions, and allowing Him to be the only one in the room that you notice.

For a long time this has been hard for me. The more time I have, the more this seems to get put off. The more responsibilities I take on, the more I tend to brush this aside. I'm either too busy, or have too much time on my hands. But I'm finding that God is the only answer to each of those.

Intimacy with God is the only answer to the five themes that everything else in my life falls into. It is only through intimacy with God that He is able to speak into, and fulfill each of those needs and desires. He is the only one that can bring true meaning to each area, and He desires to, but it is only if I am willing to get alone with Him, and take advantage of being alone with Him, that He will teach me the things that He wants me to know.

"Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another."

To God alone be the Glory!

Strength and Honor