Of loneliness

I gonna be honest - i have a fear of loneliness.



I used to watch the Home Alone movies during Christmas. I enjoyed watching young Macaulay Culkin, left stranded in New York city, battle it out with the bad guys. I don't recall him fearing because he is all alone. I am not as brave as him.

Ever since a bad experience 3 years back in Malaysia, I fear being put in a vulnerable spot. It never fails to trigger the same emotions of helplessness in me.

Perhaps loneliness is an universal fear. Even the most successful man can experience loneliness, maybe even more. We read daily celebrities being hooked on drugs, sex and alcohol. No success or popularity can buy you satisfaction of the soul. It is no good being whole on the outside when you are broken on the inside.

What is the result of loneliness? Loneliness drives people to find something/someone to fill the need. Regrettably after the Fall, we try to fill this need in all the wrong places. Loneliness has caused me to do all sorts of silly things, and to hurt those I love too.

Is loneliness such a bad thing then? Not quite. A W Tozer said, "Most of the world's greatest souls have been lonely." I humbly assume that the statement is valid only on the premise that loneliness drives them to the right source, the perfect source that drives out all fear.

Do you (I am making a big assumption someone reads my blog, haha) have a similar fear of loneliness? I think honest acknowledgment is the first step. Being in denial, based on personal experience, only serve to snowball the implications. Don't try to paper over the cracks or put up a facade (reminder to self). By posting this entry, I am taking the first step to being healed. Somehow, i feel a certain heaviness lifted in my heart. It is not so fearful to be honest after all.

On a side note, I have to find true courage soon. I am going to New York city in couple of weeks. Haha!

Jacob was left alone

There is peculiar force in the words, “Jacob was left alone.” Thus it is with all who have been trained in the school of God; they have been brought into the stillness and solitude of the Divine presence, there to view themselves and their ways, where alone they can be rightly viewed. Had Jacob continued amidst the bleating of the sheep, and the lowering of the oxen, he could not by any means have enjoyed the same calm and sober view of himself and his past course, as he was led to in the secret of the presence of God. There is no part of a man’s history so important as when he is thus led into the solitude of the Divine presence; it is there he understands things which were before dark and inexplicable. There, he can judge of himself, and see its proper nothingness and vileness.

Jacob was let into the secret of human weakness, and therefore felt that it must be divine strength or nothing. He thinks no more of his godly plans and arrangements, his presents to appease Esau. No, he stands withered and trembling before the one who had humbled him, and cries, “I will not let Thee go until Thou bless me.” He comes to the end of flesh. He clings to Christ as the poor shipwrecked mariner clings to the rock. All self-confidence is gone, all expectations from self and world blasted.

- C.H. Mackintosh

Found that this speaks to me in the midst of mugging for my papers in library these past 2 weeks. Notwithstanding some snorings, overnight in school is really quiet and helps me to focus. In a way, this self-enforced period of being left alone does aid in helping one think clearer.

Forgiven and Loved

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mHZaq6zEVM

Cant sing like Jimmy Needham, but sure can identify with him.

Tell me I’m forgiven and loved
‘Cause I hear it from the street corner priests
On how God is love and how man can be clean
But my joy has been on holiday
And my peace has almost passed away
Tell me I’m forgiven and free

CHORUS
O I tried and tried to rectify my hopeless situation
But I bought the lie I still have work to do
Now I’m working nine to five like I can earn my own salvation
But there is no condemnation in You

O whisper to me now that it’s for real
‘Cause in the silence of these walls righteousness lost its appeal
Dirty deeds have done me in
O but that can’t stop the faithful friend
Giving mercy once again as You heal
Here it is I’m feeling it

(Chorus)

O He died, He died to rectify my hopeless situation
And His blood commands my guilt to leave
Now on Calvary I stand
Empty pockets, open hands
O there is no condemnation for me

(Chorus)

Chit, you’re forgiven and loved
Chit, you’re forgiven and loved
Chit, you’re forgiven
And chit, you are loved
Chit, you’re forgiven and loved