I feel a little lonely from time to time. I'm surrounded by friends, and if I choose to there is something to do every night of the week. I'm never left without options of friends I can hang out with. Yet, somehow, I get home after hanging out with friends and feel something's missing. What is it that's missing? What is it that feels empty? The answer: I'm not actually sure. The easy answer to someone asking me that question would be "you need God". But what about someone like me who has God in their life and spends time with him? Why do people experience loneliness when everyone around them seems to have loneliness as the last thing on their mind?

Then it dawned on me. The eleven must have felt this extreme sense of loneliness the day after Jesus died. Although they had 10 others of like-faith and like-mind around them, plus countless other followers of Jesus, they must have felt a loneliness I can only imagine. The incredible Teacher that called them three years ago to follow him (the word used for 'follow' in the New Testament is closest to "be like" or "abide in") is now dead. The very person they clung to and strove to be like is gone. What a feeling of loss, of desperation. While Jesus forewarned them plenty of times, I can identify with the sense of loss when things don't match our expectations, and having expectations for something to happen a certain way even when we are clearly told it will not. I don't think it matters who was in the room at the time with those closest to Jesus, they each must have felt completely alone.

The life of sacrifice is very interesting. At a younger spiritual age, I thought that I had to sacrifice in order to grow closer to God. But I've been realizing otherwise. The closer I come to God, the more I sacrifice for him. It is a natural progression. The closer relationship I strive for and live with Him, the higher degree of abandon I have for the temporary things of this life. Following Jesus goes hand in hand with sacrificing the things of this life, bringing us closer to him, and the closer we get to him the greater sacrfice he requires. God is the master of timing, and he knows he can't require us to sacrifice certain things before we are ready. Instead, he waits patiently for us to engage the process he has laid out and begin the story of a sacrificial life. As we continue to sacrifice our life bit by bit, we grow closer to him, and we are readied to sacrifice even more for the far greater relationship with him. As we empty ourselves bit by bit of the earthly things we hold onto, he fills us back up with his pure living water and bread of life. This dual process of sacrifice and growth is where true joy comes, and loneliness falls away.

So why is it so hard sometimes to give up the desires we have for things of this world? I think Paul nailed it when he talked about the desires of the flesh, doing the very thing we don't want to do and not doing the things we want to do. "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind"- a good reminder to stay in the word and in prayer in order to realign my priorities with God's and re-realize the greatness that awaits me through the life of sacrifice and abandon to him.

So his disciples sat there, lonely and depressed, not knowing what to do. They were fearful. But the next day, hope came back and they realized that all they had needed was to trust in His words: "I will never leave you nor forsake you." Fear, loneliness, and despair fell away and the joy that can only come from direct contact with him was restored. This time, the impression stuck, and those disciples carried the message to the ends of the earth. What an awesome God we serve!