Feather's Miscellany: What Do The Lonely Do
...Perhaps that is the key to never being lonely – helping others, getting outside ourselves, as Christ taught us, to help those worse off than ourselves...
John Waddington-Feather brings a reminder of the perfect antidote to fend off loneliness.
I’ve been asked to write an essay with the title above, “What do the lonely do?” and I’m tempted at once to say “Turn to Christ and God” for in Christ’s company no one is ever lonely.
There are times when we are alone, but we need never be lonely as Christians. I’m currently alone at home for the next few weeks, as my wife helps my recently widowed daughter look after her young family of five children, whose ages range from seven months to thirteen years. I know for a fact she won’t be lonely out in Adelaide. But neither am I, living by myself in the quiet Shropshire countryside.
I have God and Christ all around me: in the love of my friends and immediate neighbours who oversee me. I have a large garden with a wood at the end of it alive with birds and wild animals, always ready to oblige me with their to-ing and fro-ing, especially around the bird-table each time I look out of the window. I have a large library of books and I’m currently reading two very different ones: a Dan Brown novel and a recently published collection of J.B.Priestley’s war-time broadcasts. I have my writing each day – and above all, connecting all these activities to each other I have Christ’s presence near me in my daily prayers and thoughts.
Of course, these activities haven’t suddenly happened. They’ve been nourished and nurtured over many years: right through school and university, through church, and throughout my life. I can in all honesty not a recall a time when I’ve been lonely.
Today I’ve been to a Lent Lunch organised throughout Lent by various members of my local church. In the morning I enjoyed their fellowship at the 9.30 am Holy Communion service, followed by tea and biscuits afterwards at the back of the church, a kind of agape; and then at lunchtime I enjoyed again the fellowship of around fifteen at a Lent Lunch in the home of one of my fellow worshippers. Can one ever be lonely as part of a church congregation?
Many of the congregation are widows, like my daughter. They, if anyone, must feel lonely at times having been married to a dearly loved spouse for many years. Yet I sense their loneliness is dispelled by their being part of the family of Christ, being regular worshippers and regularly active in the church helping others. Perhaps that is the key to never being lonely – helping others, getting outside ourselves, as Christ taught us, to help those worse off than ourselves.
John Waddington-Feather ©
