Alone When Not Alone

I admit. There are days when I feel unworthy to put out there a challenge I have a difficult time following.

But, if I were to wait and scribble the lessons I learn daily until I felt perfect, I’d have to write my blog from heaven. ‘Cause that’s when I’ll be perfect as He is.

So, here I am writing from a heart that daily struggles.

A few days ago, I got caught up into a back-and-forth argument with one of our kids. My voice got serious, yet slightly more high-pitched than usual (audible to a lot of dolphins). My body was tense. If I were a cat, my hair would’ve ridiculously raised off my back as I had fully given into frustration with the defiance going on. Suddenly, in all its irony, my watch reads “BREATH”. 

To laugh or not to laugh… that was the question.  It was timely.

I just needed to take a step back and breath out a prayer.

Especially on those challenging days, the bathroom floor has become my go-to place. It’s my place to sit down and look up. It’s my place to let my guard down and impress no one.  It’s my place to communicate with Jesus.

For me, it’s sitting on the bathroom floor looking up. For Daniel, it was kneeling in his upstairs room, windows open facing Jerusalem. For David was probably the field where he was tending his sheep, picking on the strings of his lyre. For Mary, it was at the Lord’s feet. Jesus was perfect, yet for Him, it was “the lonely places” to go talk to the Father.

If we could only understand how vital it is to meet the Lord more often in those ‘lonely places’.  If Jesus, the Son of God, found it necessary to retrieve often from the hustle and bustle of life, even from awesome, life-changing ministry, how much more should we be in the habit of this?

“Yet the news about him (Jesus) spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses.  But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” Luke 5:15-16

WHY?

‘The bathroom floor’ is not always a meeting place, it’s a meeting point throughout the day. It’s those moments when we choose to withdraw from the world to enter God’s presence to talk to the Father. 

Sitting at a desk, standing still in traffic, folding laundry, grocery-shopping, jogging on a treadmill, walking a dog, standing in line at the post office, you name it.  We can’t carry our ‘lonely place’ wherever we go, but we can surely create one on the go. It’s essential to find those alone moments to regularly check:

• if I’m intentional in glowing Jesus’ light to a cashier , a child, a co-worker, a friend, or a spouse

Matthew 5:16 “In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”

• if I am prayerful about the decisions I’m about to make

Proverbs 19:21 “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”

• if I am building up or tearing down with my words

Ephesians 4:29 “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.”

• if I am prepared to face temptations, especially on the days I’ve got a feeling everything’s going to be alright

1 Corinthians 10:12 “So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!”

• if I am careful with my imagination, not to lead me to ungodly places

Matthew 5:28 “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. ”

• if I am discerning of the websites I click on

Job 31:1 “I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a young woman.”

• if I am serving others, or waiting to be served

Mark 10;44-45 “And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

• if I’m intentional in looking for opportunities to share

Romans 1:16 “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.”

• if I remember what I read in my quiet time, and if I am applying it well

James 1:23-24 “Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.”

Today let’s sit on ‘the bathroom floor’,  that place where we can show God our bankrupt spirit in need of His investment.  The place to wait and see. The place to get reminded that our race is heaven-bound, giving up the urge to be earthly minded… ’cause “Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed” and so should we. 

Meditate and Memorize: Psalm 139:23-24