Go ahead. Knock.

Music off, computer off, phone left on silent and put away.

I've been dabbling with the silence lately.

I don't usually sit in quiet. hardly ever.

But lately, I've just needed to listen. I need to soak up the fullness of His presence and hear His voice.

But the truth about the quiet is that it has opened me up so wide. It has turned on dulled senses. It has faced me toward some of the most raw and lonely places.

It is a constant struggle for me not to reach for my phone, always at my side. With my mouth I say I want to walk with God, but so often my actions shout that I crave a culturally acceptable numbness that keeps me from pain.

So many of us know truth with our ears. We know truth in song. We know truth in sweet conversations with friends. But it feels rare to experience truth in the seething corners of our hearts or in the hurtful, skewed moments we keep close and buried. We start to feel the quiet working on us... and we reach for the phone, scroll through instagram or twitter or facebook.

So I pursue the intimate presence of my Jesus. my heart beats in a steady rhythm. my world becomes quiet.

... and I start to ask Jesus what He felt when He was here on earth. Fully human, fully God. God with breakable bones. Then I imagine the desperate, internal communion Jesus faithfully kept with His Father. and I know I want it, too.

Because of who Jesus was, is, and always will be, I am able to embrace the lonely. No need to hide from it. I am choosing instead to ask Jesus into it with me.

It's then when I find myself truly not alone.

Even in our most unified moments as humans, we can feel alone. Even with your most favorite friends, in huge crowds. Even with a husband at your side, and a full quiver of kids. Every single one of us can find ourselves deep in the crevices of loneliness. We find ourselves feeling exposed. unfixed. Because there is no people fix, no earthly father, no covering that will captivate our souls like the covering that Jesus gives.

You know what I'm realizing in the lonely?

I'm realizing a Love that recklessly pursues me. I'm realizing the beauty to be found in sitting with my ever-present Jesus and inviting Him into every nook and cranny of my soul. I'm realizing that it's from the solitude found in His presence that I am then able to reach out to community and practice the healing of togetherness in Him.

Too often in loneliness, I look for a quick fix. I want it fixed now. I don't want to be lonely anymore. So out comes the phone, the computer, the tv.

But I think sometimes the answer is something entirely different.

What if we allowed the quiet? What if we faced the lonely? What if we entered into the secret place and asked Jesus to sit in the loneliness with us for a bit?

I think maybe that lonely place might be exactly where the door is. The door we are invited to freely knock on. The one which Jesus promises to open.

So go ahead.

Knock.

Love to you,
Alyssa