We can certainly feel very alone at times.
Sometimes we actively isolate ourselves from others through a selfish action, cutting comment, unreplied text, or even closed door. Other times it comes as a consequence of something wholly outside our control. But really any time spent alone eventually yields the same sense of isolation.
This lonely perception is a reality we face daily, and often with fear. Wondering: why we were abandoned, what we are missing out on, how people really feel about us, and if we can be forgiven. All the while convinced no one can really understand what we are going through. This sense of isolation is palpable and at times can feel overwhelming.
Alas there is hope:
“I’m absolutely convinced that nothing-nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable-absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our master has embraced us.”
Nothing.
Nothing can separate us.
The truth that regardless of how distant we may feel, we are never alone, is at once comforting and unbelievable. My mind wanders to ask, “Really? Nothing?” And yet there God is. Both faithful and present in spite of my imperfection. Faithful and present in spite of my insistence that I have been abandoned.
What hubris to credit ourselves as being capable of separation from God.
Discovering instead that the distance I perceive is self-generated brings tremendous relief. Understanding that God is waiting within reach to comfort and restore us if we might only ask is remarkable.
Perhaps the power we sense in connection with isolation is not loneliness but the gravity of God’s proximity. For we already know his strength is made perfect in our weakness. Let us therefore cast off the lonely burden of isolation and instead embrace God and community.