God Brings His People With Him
I want to stay in the first chapter of Paul’s second letter to Timothy this week. Last week we saw how Paul showed Timothy a God-centred life - defined by God’s grace, fanning into flame God’s gift, suffering for God even.
But if you look closely at his words, people are at the heart of Paul’s message. He was a God-centred man, but you see, wherever God goes, he brings His people with. And so when we put God in the centre, God’s people go in the centre too.
Craving True Connection
This is something that many people don’t get. Many of us try to avoid people as much as possible, don’t we? Because people are complicated, and they’re broken, and they’re frustrating, and they’re hurtful, and much of the time it’s easier to just shut ourselves off from people.
In fact I read an article this week by a journalist named Michael Dausch. He spent three days in a Benedictine monastery to try get a sense of what the monastic life was about. At first he says he couldn’t handle the silence! It was all so quiet apart from when they would chant their chants, and it really perturbed him. But then, he writes this: “it hit me: Silence better described my life outside the monastery than the life of the monks. I stare into screens for hours, often lonely and isolated. I live in a crowded, cut-throat city where a famous resident once advised, “If you want a friend, get a dog.” For all the loud happy hours and decadent dinners, it is well known that people are starved for connection, sick of superficial small talk and living like strangers afraid to say what they really feel and who they really are.”
And then he says “Forget the monks: How do I get through that every day? Why do I pursue such a solitary existence?”
I wonder if those words make sense to you. Living in a busy city with people all around you, lots of noise and distraction… but solitary.
Embrace God's People
In the words of an old Bon Jovi song: “I won’t be alone, but you know that don’t mean I’m not lonely”.
Paul could’ve chosen a life of a monk - cut off from the world. He could’ve spent all his time writing about God but not actually connecting with people. But he did neither! He put people in the centre of his life, and oh I hope that we modern Christians will do the same! I hope we are people-centred people: so centred on God that we can’t help but love his people in spite of their warts and wobbles!
If you want God in the centre of your life, don’t be alarmed when he brings his broken and difficult people with Him to the centre.
