The Lord gave us the Sabbath day, with the command that we keep this day holy. On this day, we get together as a community to pray, to worship, and to give thanks. For those of us in chronic pain, sometimes that community is harder to get than for others. If the physical pain is debilitating, then we cannot either get to, or through, a communal service. If the pain is mental or spiritual, well…seeing all those people can sometimes make the pain worse. However, if we look at the life of Jesus, I think we see only three times that He was alone. First, He went into the desert as the Father wished. Then, He would leave His apostles to pray by Himself, but He returned after the night or early morning. Finally, when He was about to take up His cross He went into the garden to pray; and He remained alone until His resurrection. So Christ found it important to be with others, just as He knew it was important to spend time with His Father. Maybe we can’t make it through a service, but are you alone? We need to have our alone time with our Heavenly Father, but we must also have people in our life. Who walks with you?
Amen! God never intended for His children to be loners. Interacting in the lives of our brothers and sisters in Christ is one of the marks of a true Christian. How can we say we love God and turn our back on the family of God?
ReplyDelete~Ron
You're right Ron, but you'd be surprised how many people loose interest when someone has been home bound after a few weeks or months. The other side of the coin are the ones who push people away because the pain effects their pride. It is your last sentence that is most telling, thanks.
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