Fix your eyes on Jesus

Have you moved recently and lost friends and you're lonely? Or have your friends moved and lost you, and you're lonely? Or do you have people all around but they don't know you well, or worse, don't understand you -- and you're lonely? Or are you a shut-in, and you're lonely? Fix your eyes on the only One Who truly understands, because He's the only One Who has ever experienced true loneliness. Jesus wasn't totally lonely when His own family thought He was crazy (Mark 3:21). He wasn't totally lonely when all the people of His own hometown tried to kill Him (Luke 4:28-29). He wasn't totally lonely when His own fellow nationals took the responsibility for having Him crucified (Matthew 27:24-25), or when one of His very own disciples turned Him in to make it happen (Matthew 26:14-16), or when His much-loved Peter denied any connection with Him (John 18:25-27), or even when eventually every one of His eleven best friends left Him in the lurch (Matthew 26:56). Through it all He could turn to His Father for much-needed comfort and fellowship. But then, for the first time in eternity, Jesus discovered true, ultimate loneliness. When He "became sin for us" (2 Corinthians 5:21), God Himself had to turn His face away and cut Him off. Suddenly Jesus had no one at all -- not even God! In this new, strange, hellish horror, Jesus let loose a roar: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46). [It is] a scream of despairing agony in the darkness. It is the picture of an eclipsed God and a lost soul; it is the hour and power of darkness: the hosts of hell fill it, and the opaque sins of a world thicken it: It is Jesus bearing MY sin in His own body on the tree. It is Jesus taking the place of a lost soul.1 Jesus on the cross became truly lonely, so that you and I would never need to be. Listen carefully: Your loneliness is unnecessary. Do you know that? In fact, if loneliness is long-term and chronic with you, it's disobedient. It's not taking seriously His promise, "Surely I will be with you always" (Matthew 28:20). You see, When on the cross Jesus found out what real loneliness felt like, He made sure it need never happen to you. This is your secret to overcoming loneliness: Fix your eyes on Him. People suggest lots of prescriptions: get busy, get involved in your church and community, do things for others, find a friend, join a small group -- no, no! Not first! First in your loneliness, draw from Jesus. See how He drew and drew from His Father, His ever-flowing Source of all love and comfort and hope and pleasure and fullness: Very early in the morning, when it was still dark, Jesus got up . . . and prayed (Mark 1:35). He even deliberately sought aloneness, for the best togetherness of all: Crowds of people came to hear him . . . but Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed (Luke 5:15-16). You do the same. Sit at His feet, and spread out your loneliness before Him. Apologize! Admit you've been fixing your eyes on yourself -- no wonder. He is complete in the Father, and He says you are complete in Him (Colossians 2:9-10). He -- and only He -- is full of fullness for you. When, humanly speaking, you feel all alone, your heart can still be happy and satisfied: You are complete in Him. Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me (Psalm 27:10). Read the Bible; feast on it. Jesus is "Immanuel -- God with you" (Matthew 1:23). He is closer than close, tender, comforting. He loves you! Drink in all that He is; He will become in you "a spring of water welling up to everlasting life" (John 4:14; 7:38). Then in that fullness, go to touch other lives: Get involved in your church and community, do things for others, find a friend, join a small group . . .2 Wherever you go, you'll go in the spirit of satisfaction and wholeness and deep-welling joy -- because first you were healed; first you fixed your eyes on Jesus. ____________ 1. Oswald J. Sanders, Christ Incomparable, p.167. 2. See my book Discipling One Another (Word, 1979). -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pray this prayer to Him: O Lord Jesus, You know how cut off and lonely I've been feeling. Forgive me, Lord! I was acting like an atheist! But now I come near to You, and according to Your promise in James 4:8, You have come near to me. Lord, Psalm 16:8 says that in Your presence is fullness of joy! Then-- "I delight to sit in [your] shade, and [your] fruit is sweet to my taste" (Song of Solomon 2:3). Amen. * * * * * Strong are the walls around me That hold me all the day, But they who thus have bound me Cannot keep God away. My very prison walls are dear Because the God I love is here. They know, who thus oppress me 'Tis hard to be alone, But know not, One can bless me Who comes through bars and stone: He makes my dungeon's darkness bright And fills my bosom with delight. --Madame Jeanne Guyon (1648-1717), written when she was in solitary confinement because of her Christian faith, in a prison in France * * * * * You who have no longer a mother to love you, and yet crave for love, God will be as a mother. You who have no brother to help you, and have so much need of support, God will be your brother. You who have no friends to comfort you, and stand so much in need of consolation, God will be your friend. --Gold Dust, a little centuries-old book of unknown origin