Sabbath: February 25, 2018

In 2004, I filled a backpack with clothes, grabbed my guitar, and hopped on a plane to Scotland. It was an adventure. I bargained for that. What I didn’t bargain for was the aloneness. Though I traveled on planes and trains to exciting locations with brilliant people, I still didn’t really know anyone very well. It was six weeks before I made a friend in the middle of a high church service in an old stone abbey. We were singing in a choir. We both messed up. We both started giggling. He couldn’t stop because he thought it was funny. I couldn’t stop because it felt so good to laugh with someone so far from home.

This week, we’re going to focus on our hunger for relationship. This is a deep hunger for so many of us. Social media connects us instantly and almost effortlessly, yet people in our part of the world feel more disconnected than ever. This makes church a rare gift today: a place where people gather across generations on a regular basis. We gather, we greet, we sing, we pray… we’re different, you and me, in what we do as church together.

Today, just think of a time in your life that you’ve felt alone. Now think of how this connects you with Jesus this season. I daresay that Jesus felt alone pretty often, especially as he drew closer to Jerusalem. Read the gospels and you’ll see that even in the middle of a crowd, Jesus had a knack for being misunderstood, marginalized, and maligned. Yet Jesus shared his aloneness in community with us, and so we share in community with each other in the Body of Christ. We are never alone, even in our aloneness. Even when we feel far from home. Thanks be to God.

Drew Willson