Enough

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Despite all the tools of modern society, feeling alone still ranks high on the list of ills suffered by many people. Despite Twitter and FACEBOOK, despite an endless variety of groups to belong to, including church, these communities don’t always spell “communion.” Even where relationships are possible, the number of times people who move from one relationship to another, always seeking that elusive something but never finding it, astounds me. Equally disturbing is the number of co-dependent and abusive relationships out there. Some people don’t dare let go—the prospect of being alone is too frightening.

The Weather Network calls us “The Angry Planet,” but we’d be better called “The Lonely Planet.”

Every relationship, no matter now good, is transitory. That’s what we struggle to understand. People move, people change, people die. People come into our lives and they move out of our lives.

Jesus touched on the subject in a statement he made, recorded for us in John 16:32: “But a time is coming, and has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me.”

I once heard someone say that relationship with God wasn’t enough, that every person needed to be connected with a small group within the community of the church. I would never argue that the ministry of a small group isn’t valuable or that the community of believers isn’t important in our lives. But I do take exception to the statement that God isn’t enough.

Jesus understood the frailty of human relationships. He also understood that the very nature of that frailty demanded that our chief relationship be with Someone who would never move, never change, never die.

He knew His disciples would soon abandon Him. From the human perspective He would be left to face the cross alone. However, realistically, He was never alone.

And neither are we. But instead of holding on lightly to our human relationships and embracing our relationship with God with greater fervour, we often hold lightly to our relationship with God in order to give our heart and our energy more fully to relationships that, even at their best, will not last.

If God isn’t enough, eventually we become one of those statistics, one of those lonely people. The sad part is that even when our human relationships are good, we remain lonely until He becomes enough.