Lessons: Exod. 23:1-3, 31-33 S-123
John 8:21-29
AC 139
BEING ALONE WITH THE LORD
A sermon by the Rev. Lawson M. Smith. May 22, 1988
And Jehovah God said, "It is not good that the man should be
alone." (Gen. 2:18)
Loneliness is a widespread problem in America today. In earlier
eras, extended families lived together or near each other.
Parents and grandparents offered support and continuity, older
people lived in the care of their children and grandchildren, and
unmarried people enjoyed the sphere of their parents, brothers and
sisters. As even the nuclear families break down, single parents
and the children of divorce find themselves alone a lot of the
time.
Mass education, entertainment and other services do not alleviate
but often intensify the sense of loneliness, compared with the
days when relationships were closer and more intimate because the
scale was smaller.
People often fear to be alone. Habitually we switch on the radio
as soon as we get into the car, or the TV if we're in the house
alone, just for company. People eat out rather than in the
privacy of home more and more. Often we are not very comfortable
being alone with time to reflect on our lives or our recent
experiences, so we turn to one of the many distractions available.
What does the Word teach about being alone? On one hand, we are
created to be of service to others. Love to the neighbor is one
of the highest loves. It is the truly human state to care for
others. Yet there is a sense in which it is good to be alone with
the Lord. Such states are necessary for spiritual life. If men
gave themselves a little more time and mental focus on being alone
with the Lord, it might even ease some of the isolation many feel.
How does this fit with an active life of love to the neighbor?
The Writings speak clearly against the monastic ideal of isolation
from the world. "To receive the life of heaven," we are taught,
"a man must live in the world and engage in the duties and
employments there, and by means of a moral and civil life receive
the spiritual life. In no other way can the spiritual life be
formed with man, or his spirit be prepared for heaven; for to live
an internal life [of prayers and meditation on the Word] and not
at the same time an external life is like dwelling in a house that
has no foundation, that gradually sinks or becomes cracked and
rent asunder, or totters till it falls." (HH 528)
When Jesus prayed for His disciples as He was about to depart from
the world, He said, "I have given them Your Word; and the world
has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not
of the world. [Nevertheless,] I do not pray that You should take
them out of the world, but that You should keep them from evil.
They are not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your
Word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent
them into the world." (John 17:14-18)
The Lord sends us into the world, but we are not to be worldly.
We are to be sanctified, to have our lives purified, by the truth
of His Word, as we live in the world.
One way this idea is expressed in the Old Testament is by the
familiar words, "You shall not follow a multitude to do evil."
The whole passage reads, "You shall not circulate a false report.
Do not put your hand with the wicked to be a witness in support of
violence. You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; nor shall you
testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after many to pervert
justice. You shall not show partiality to a poor man in his
dispute." (Exodus 23:1-3)
The spiritual sense of this passage fits closely with the letter.
"Not to circulate a false report" is not to listen to false
values. "Not putting our hand with the wicked" means not obeying
feelings of malice, which would lead us to affirm things contrary
to charity--"to be a witness in support of violence." "Not
testifying in a dispute to pervert justice" means not associating
with people who by twisted logic turn good things into bad things
and truths into falsities, and vice versa--who make evil things
seem allowable and good, and false things true. And "not to show
partiality to a poor man" is not to favor the false views of
people who are ignorant, just because they are ignorant. (AC
9247-9253)
These laws are clearly applicable to us today. There are many
false reports being circulated in our culture--lies about the
relations between the sexes, about what is and is not honest,
prejudices against various groups of people, and appeals in
advertising and entertainment to all kinds of base instincts. We
must not listen to them, nor allow them to circulate among us or
our children.
The world's influence is like the atmosphere in which we live--it
affects us profoundly and in many ways. Not all is bad and false,
but a lot of things are. For example, no-fault divorce laws and
the ease with which people can be remarried civilly unconsciously
undermine our determination to make our marriages work. The
cultural assumptions about marriage are much weaker than the
doctrines, and they touch our lives in many ways. If we are not
careful to follow the Lord, it is easy to follow the multitude in
supporting ways of life and values that twist good things, such as
faithfulness in marriage, into something laughable or impractical,
and turn bad things, such as premarital sex, into an acceptable
lifestyle.
Sometimes the public purveyors of these false values do not know
any better. We may therefore excuse them personally, but we must
not accept their views--we must not show partiality to a
spiritually poor man in his dispute, just because he is ignorant.
The New Church is still in a spiritual wilderness today, both
around us and within us. New Churchmen are very few, and our
understanding of the kind of culture the Lord would like us to
establish is confused and full of falsities. The New Church is
still in its infancy, but the Lord is taking care of it and
providing for its growth, and He will take care of us too, if we
let Him.
In this sense, it is good for man to be alone, alone with the
Lord. In fact, the spiritual sense of the words, "And Jehovah God
said, 'It is not good that the man should be alone,'" shows that
really it was our idea, not the Lord's, that we should not be
alone. This story is the beginning of the fall of mankind, when
people were no longer content to dwell alone under the Lord's
guidance, but desired also to have input from self and the world--
to take worldly power and prosperity into account. Jehovah God
saw that it no longer seemed good to man to dwell alone, so He
granted the beginning of proprium.
To dwell alone, spiritually, means to live without evil spirits
infesting us. Balaam once blessed the children of Israel in these
words, speaking of them as dwelling alone: "How shall I curse whom
God has not cursed? And how shall I denounce whom God has not
denounced? For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the
hills I behold him; there! a people dwelling alone, not reckoning
itself among the nations." (Num.23:8-9) And Moses, prophesying
the time when all the nations would be driven out of the land,
said, "Then Israel shall dwell in safety, the fountain of Jacob
alone." (Dt.33:28)
Like the Most Ancients, however, the Israelites later wanted very
much to be among the nations--to have a king like other nations,
to worship their gods, to follow the world. Not to dwell alone is
to hunger for worldly recognition and status. We too, under the
infestation of evil spirits, tend to look around with envy at the
ways of the world. By contrast, once the prophet Elisha, in
return for a woman's kindness to him, offered to speak on her
behalf to the king or the commander of the army; but her answer
was, "I dwell among my own people." (2 Ki.4:13) She was saying
that she was content with her lot, and did not aspire to
prominence or greater wealth. What she really wanted was a son,
because she was barren.
In heaven, we are told, the best angels do not live together in
societies, but apart, home by home and family by family. These
angels are more closely under the Lord's Divine guidance than
others, who depend more on the opinion of society. (HH 50, 189)
It is essential for us to spend some time alone with the Lord once
in a while, away from the distractions of other people. Sometimes
it is necessary to get away from public pressure so that we can
hear what the Lord is saying to us. The Lord speaking to us in
our conscience often speaks in a still, small voice, which is only
audible when we have put away other commotions and pressures. The
Writings specifically contrast the kinds of thoughts we have in
public with the thoughts we have in the privacy of home, which are
our real beliefs.
In particular, Jesus advised us, "When you pray, go into your
room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is
in secret; and your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you
openly. . . Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the
hypocrites, with a sad countenance. For they disfigure their
faces that they may appear to men to be fasting. Truly, I say to
you, they have their reward. But you, when you fast, anoint your
head and wash your face, so that you do not appear to men to be
fasting, but to your Father who is in secret; and your Father, who
sees in secret, will reward you openly." (Mt.6:6,16-18)
The Lord Himself several times went up to a mountain to pray.
Just before the beginning of His public ministry, He spent forty
days alone in the wilderness. In times of temptation, a person
feels especially alone, as though no one else in the world could
understand or had ever experienced this kind of grief, and as
though God Himself were gone. At the extremity of His temptation,
Jesus cried out, "My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?"
(Matt. 27:46) But the Writings teach that the Lord is never
closer than in times of temptation. He is intimately present,
counter-balancing the attacks of the hells and preserving our
freedom to choose as if of ourselves.
When we win in temptation, and we realize that it was by the
Lord's power, we feel closer to the Lord than ever before, because
we want the Lord to be with us, and so He can dwell with us,
bringing consolation and peace. So the Lord told His disciples,
on the eve of His crucifixion, "Indeed, the hour is coming, yes,
has now come, that you will be scattered, each to his own, and
will leave Me alone; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is
with Me." (Jn.16:32) "Yea, though I walk through the valley of
the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me."
(Ps.23:4) * * * * *
There is a bad kind of aloneness or aloofness from others,
represented in the Word especially by Ishmael, of whom the angel
said, "He shall be a wild-ass man, his hand against every man, and
every man's hand against him. And he shall dwell against the
faces of all his brethren." (Gen.16:12) Ishmael represents a
state of rational truth separated from rational good, an
inevitable state in our regeneration, in which we have learned
truths but apply them primarily to others, rather than to
ourselves. In this state, we are taught, a person is "quick to
find fault, makes no allowances, is against all, regards everyone
as being in error, is instantly prepared to rebuke, chasten and
punish, shows no pity, and does not apply himself or make any
effort to redirect others' thinking." (AC 1949) Inwardly it is
often a defensive posture, though outwardly such a person may
appear aggressive, because he does not yet have enough trust in
the Lord or in other people. He feels alone.
Selfishness is always inwardly lonely, because it is an attitude
that does not look toward being conjoined with others, but only to
using others selfishly, for one's own advancement, or even to ease
one's loneliness. Possibly we see this in Martha's complaint to
Jesus, that her sister Mary had left her to serve alone. And the
Lord taught that unless we give up a selfish life, we will remain
alone. We have a choice of eternal loneliness, or the happiness
of eternal conjunction with the Lord and a useful life of service
to and with others. The Lord said, "Unless a grain of wheat falls
into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it
produces much grain. He who loves his life will lose it, and he
who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there My
servant will be also." (Jn.12:24-26)
States of temptation, and Ishmael states of truth apart from good,
are necessary for us to learn that we depend on the Lord, that we
cannot do without Him. In this way we also learn humility, which
prepares the way for treating others' shortcomings with patience
and kindness as well. We find that we are not alone in our
failings and sorrows, both because others share these burdens, but
mainly because the Lord Himself is with us.
So to be alone with the Lord--to set aside time to reflect on
where the Lord is leading us in this stage of our lives--is not at
all contrary to an active life of charity toward the neighbor.
Periodic self-examination with prayer to the Lord can help us
identify areas in which we can amend and improve our life of
charity. It allows the Lord to teach us humility and patience.
Reflective times with the Word allow the Lord to speak to us
without the commotion of public pressures.
The Lord cares more for our happiness than we can imagine. Let us
not let the evil spirits make us discontent with the lot the Lord
has provided us, so that we are always too busy hurrying after the
multitude to listen to Him. Let us cherish and use the wonderful
truths the Lord is teaching us at His second coming, and be
content to dwell alone with Him, home by home, family by family,
setting our standards according to His Word. Amen.