Companioning with God

IN an era of unprecedented activity and social exchange, isn't it incredible how lonely we can still feel? In our desire to assuage lonelines, we may become convinced that if we could form just one good relationship our loneliness would be washed away. If we think more deeply about loneliness, we may find that what we're really longing for is some clue that we are good and valuable, that our being around makes a difference to someone, anyone! We may want a deep assurance that God hasn't goofed in making us; that, as the Bible teaches, He has endowed us with qualities inherent in His own nature which enable us to bless others.

The search for a solution to loneliness actually becomes a search for the child of God. We need to start recognizing and cherishing the spiritual beauty and value inherent in our being as God's offspring. We need to understand that God is seeing something quite different than we are seeing when we view ourselves as alone, inadequate. That picture of us springs from the wrong things, from such criteria as physical attractiveness, popularity, athletic prowess. It is time to start knowing what God is knowing about us -- what He has actually created. And what He has created is not an inadequate fleshly personality but His complete, satisfied spiritual likeness.

Isn't this new way of thinking about ourselves a kind of companioning with God? It's learning to accept ourselves as His children, capable of expressing His nature and worthy of feeling His love.

We read in the Christian Science textbook by Mary Baker Eddy:1 ``Divine Love always has met and always will meet every human need.''2 How freeing it is really to trust God to meet our need for companionship in whatever way can most bless us and others! The love expressed to us by another is of God -- it is God's love meeting a human need in a way we can understand. But His love for us isn't expressed just by one person. If it were, what would we do when we were not with that person?

Companioning with God includes feeling His love wherever and with whomever we are. But to do so consistently requires that we identify and know ourselves as He knows us, as good and expressive of His nature. And it's important that we live consistently with this reality. Then we need to trust the ability of others to value the qualities God is expressing in us. And we need to know and value the same in them. Our companioning with God then begins to embrace an active companioning with His children all around us.

This in no way diminishes the loving bond we feel with any one individual. Rather, it strengthens that bond. It's a bit like discovering there's a whole rainbow of colors to enjoy when we have been accustomed to only one. Shifting from a monochromatic viewpoint doesn't lessen our love for that one color. That one, seen in proper relationship to all others, is enhanced, not diminished.

Each of God's children is essential to Him, because each expresses God in a way no one else can. Each is essential to the full expression of His nature. As Christ Jesus told his disciples, ``The very hairs of your head are all numbered.''3 True companioning, then, involves cherishing the true nature of each individual. Only in this broader sense of companioning do we experience the full, consistent, and practical expression of God's love for us, which washes away loneliness.

1The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science. 2Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 494. 3Matthew 10:30.

You can find more articles like this one in the Christian Science Sentinel, a weekly magazine. DAILY BIBLE VERSE: I am not alone, because the Father is with me. John 16:32