The Crutch of Community
I'm learning that college friendships are the best but they're also the most brutal. Especially at a school like Taylor, where "intentional community" permeates every inch of the campus, it feels necessary to be constantly surrounded by six or seven or twenty-five friends at all times. The friendships are harder because you never really get a break from anyone, and people want to go deeper, which means raw confrontation, rich conversation, and a readiness to call each other out. It's a time of road trips and spontaneous sleepovers and hometown visits getting to know people deeply, but that doesn't mean it's easy.
Don't get me wrong, God has been so faithful in providing friendships at Taylor. My former roommates, famously deemed "The Maggies," are my constant companions and probably know more about me than I know about myself. When the Maggies aren't around, there are several girls on my wing that I can call up for dinner. I've had a different roommate almost every semester and there is no doubt in my mind that any one of those girls would have my back. I love these people deeply. And there's people I don't see everyday that I love just as much (sup Lilly??) I have friends, okay? I'm sure I do...
SoOooOOOOOoooooo WHY does life feel so lonely sometimes?! Why does it feel like there are days when no one is around and no one listens and the people that do listen surely don't truly understand??? Why does it feel like you are constantly fighting to keep friends around and going back to an empty room means you blew it. You're a social nightmare and you blew it. Why does it feel like Saturday nights are so stressful? Is it because of that one time that no one was available to hang out and you have convinced yourself that every Saturday night will be the same way? Why does so much of our identity lie in popularity?
I think Satan likes to capitalize on our loneliness because we can so often use friendships as a crutch.
When those friendships aren't around or maybe they don't feel as present, that is the time that Satan likes to get inside our minds and whisper lies like, "you have no one" and "you are nothing." It causes us to value the importance of friendship over our dependence on God.
In fact, it is a very real possibility that we have made friendships a god in our lives. We rely on them to sustain us and complete us and if we don't have that, we don't have anything. Maybe we aren't using friendships instead of God, but could it be that we depend on friendships in addition to God?
In a lot of ways, my best friends provide me with things I think I need: a place of belonging, familiarity, someone to laugh with.
But they don't save me. And really, deep down, they don't even satisfy me. If they did, I wouldn't constantly be clawing for some much-needed introvert time and I wouldn't find myself desperately seeking out other sources of companionship. Putting God-sized expectations on sinful human beings isn't just foolish...it's sinful.
In Jeremiah 2, God describes the types of evil that Israel has committed against him. Not only do they forsake God, but they carve out their "own cisterns for themselves...broken cisterns that can hold no water" (v. 13). So instead of running toward the stream that can satisfy, they rely on their own cisterns for fulfillment. But the cisterns are just as broken and as empty as we are and we find that we have poured so much time into something other than God and now we are desperately digging for a drink in a place where we won't find it.
Picture this: we substitute the word "cistern" with "sister."
We devote our lives to creating our own sisters for ourselves. Sisters are our friends, the community around us who is meant for a good thing. But we rely on them to quench our eternal longing. And the thing about sisters is that they might be fun and familiar and they might provide a place of belonging, but they are broken. They are sinful and fallen and rendered completely powerless when it comes to salvation.
It is easy to keep running to our broken sisters to fill a void that only God can fill. It is easy to convince ourselves that having God as a friend isn't enough. We can become so dependent on our sisters that we never look to the stream - the fountain of living water - which is the only thing that will satisfy our souls.
Don't let Satan use your loneliness to tear down your identity. Don't let friendships become your God Don't spend so much time carving into your cisterns (or sisters) that you forget to drink from the living water of your Heavenly Father.
Most of all, don't let friendships become such a crutch that you don't lean on God. He is the truest friend you will ever need.
Don't get me wrong, God has been so faithful in providing friendships at Taylor. My former roommates, famously deemed "The Maggies," are my constant companions and probably know more about me than I know about myself. When the Maggies aren't around, there are several girls on my wing that I can call up for dinner. I've had a different roommate almost every semester and there is no doubt in my mind that any one of those girls would have my back. I love these people deeply. And there's people I don't see everyday that I love just as much (sup Lilly??) I have friends, okay? I'm sure I do...
SoOooOOOOOoooooo WHY does life feel so lonely sometimes?! Why does it feel like there are days when no one is around and no one listens and the people that do listen surely don't truly understand??? Why does it feel like you are constantly fighting to keep friends around and going back to an empty room means you blew it. You're a social nightmare and you blew it. Why does it feel like Saturday nights are so stressful? Is it because of that one time that no one was available to hang out and you have convinced yourself that every Saturday night will be the same way? Why does so much of our identity lie in popularity?
I think Satan likes to capitalize on our loneliness because we can so often use friendships as a crutch.
When those friendships aren't around or maybe they don't feel as present, that is the time that Satan likes to get inside our minds and whisper lies like, "you have no one" and "you are nothing." It causes us to value the importance of friendship over our dependence on God.
In fact, it is a very real possibility that we have made friendships a god in our lives. We rely on them to sustain us and complete us and if we don't have that, we don't have anything. Maybe we aren't using friendships instead of God, but could it be that we depend on friendships in addition to God?
In a lot of ways, my best friends provide me with things I think I need: a place of belonging, familiarity, someone to laugh with.
But they don't save me. And really, deep down, they don't even satisfy me. If they did, I wouldn't constantly be clawing for some much-needed introvert time and I wouldn't find myself desperately seeking out other sources of companionship. Putting God-sized expectations on sinful human beings isn't just foolish...it's sinful.
In Jeremiah 2, God describes the types of evil that Israel has committed against him. Not only do they forsake God, but they carve out their "own cisterns for themselves...broken cisterns that can hold no water" (v. 13). So instead of running toward the stream that can satisfy, they rely on their own cisterns for fulfillment. But the cisterns are just as broken and as empty as we are and we find that we have poured so much time into something other than God and now we are desperately digging for a drink in a place where we won't find it.
Picture this: we substitute the word "cistern" with "sister."
We devote our lives to creating our own sisters for ourselves. Sisters are our friends, the community around us who is meant for a good thing. But we rely on them to quench our eternal longing. And the thing about sisters is that they might be fun and familiar and they might provide a place of belonging, but they are broken. They are sinful and fallen and rendered completely powerless when it comes to salvation.
It is easy to keep running to our broken sisters to fill a void that only God can fill. It is easy to convince ourselves that having God as a friend isn't enough. We can become so dependent on our sisters that we never look to the stream - the fountain of living water - which is the only thing that will satisfy our souls.
Don't let Satan use your loneliness to tear down your identity. Don't let friendships become your God Don't spend so much time carving into your cisterns (or sisters) that you forget to drink from the living water of your Heavenly Father.
Most of all, don't let friendships become such a crutch that you don't lean on God. He is the truest friend you will ever need.