Sorrow and Joy

Who hasn't experienced sorrow?  It is the knife that pierces our soul with the blood of tears flowing like waterfalls from out wounded emotions.

I have seen the strongest men weep. I have wept with them in their despair. I have cried in funeral sermons I've preached. And, I have wept from the painful losses I've experienced. Who hasn't experienced sorrow?

Sorrows like sea billows roll over us. Sadness and grief overwhelm us. We become as helpless as a baby. Everything secure is shattered into a thousand pieces.

There was a time in my life when I lost everything. I lost my job, my career as a full time pastor, and my family. I cried and couldn't turn off the tears. My mind said, "Stop!"  It my emotional pain from he injury and loss I suffered wouldn't listen to my rational voice. I couldn't sleep even though my body was tired. When I was able to sleep, I slept in fits and starts awaking and hoping that it was time to get up. Sometimes, I'd just get up anyway and pace the floor.

Loneliness or Solitude

One of my favorite songs is "One Is the Loneliest Number" by Three Dog Night. It was released in 1969 and climbed to number 4 on the charts.

 

Lonely and alone is not a pleasant place.  God created us to be relational.  "It is not good for man to live alone" (Genesis 2:18).

 

It's no fun eating alone at a restaurant.  A night at the movie is better shared with a friend or a spouse. Sitting in a church pew all alone leaves an empty, incomplete feeling. One is the loneliest number.

 

Throw in our built-in God given need for companionship with the unhealthy addiction of co-dependency and a feeling of desperation can drive the lonesome heart into depression. The co-dependent will be and do anything to have a companion. Irrational thoughts take control because of the false sense that I am nobody until somebody loves me.

 

Loneliness plays with the mind.  Thoughts like, "There must be something wrong with me.  Why can't I keep a relationship?  A friendship?  It has to be me!" Thoughts like these play like a bad tune over and over in our mind.  

 

Feelings of worthlessness crowd out the truth.  The truth is that I can be complete within myself.

Conflict or Peace

We are relational beings because God is relational and created us in His image. Without the peace only Christ gives us, relationships are broken. The relationship of my emotions, mind, and spirit is broken instead of in unity. Relationships with others are corrupted, and the relationship with God is distant or non-existent. Where there is no peace, conflict rages within us and without us.

Only Christ gives calming peace, and He gives peace through His love relationship with us.

Our Trinitarian God is relational. Father, Son, and Spirit. Three persons. One God in perfect unity and harmony.

In turn, God created us to be relational with Him and with others. In a relationship, we are connected to one another through common interests, goals, and desires. We are connected to one another emotionally, mentally, and in a spiritual way too. And, I am connected within myself emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. 

Deaf and Blind or Hear and See?

What we can see, feel, hear, taste, and smell binds us to this world. Imagination allows our mind to form mental images or concepts of what is not actually present to the senses. But, the product of  our mental creation is  often a baseless or fanciful one. Revelation is to make known that which is unknown by our five senses. 

 

The unknown is revealed only by the person who knows. In the unknown world of the spirit, God, who knows all, has chosen to make Himself known to us who do not know. The fullest, most complete revelation of God came through the Son. If we want to know the character of God and who He is, look at Jesus. Jesus said, " If you really know me, you will know my Father as well (John 14:7). 

 

Know means an intimate relationship like between a husband and wife in conjugal relationship. In that relationship, two become one. And so it is between a believer and the Spirit of Christ. Two become one with the Spirit of Christ inside a believer. The Apostle Paul notes, "I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me (Galatians 2:20). And in Colossians 1:27, "God has chosen to make known the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory."  

 

So, how do we know what God has made known through Christ. We know by faith. We believe. And where does faith come from?  What makes faith possible?  The Scripture says, "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (Romans 10:17). 

 

Revelation on God's part and faith on our part is the transaction that transports us into the world of the unseen. God reveals. I believe. Then, I am able to see into the unseen world. I cross the threshold for what I can perceive with my five senses into what I can see, feel, and hear through the Spirit. This is not a figment of my imagination, but rather, it is truth. In fact, the unseen world of the Spirit is actually the real world. That's where my focus needs to be. "We fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Corinthians 4:18).