Solitude is good. Loneliness is bad. It is good to learn how to be alone, to be at peace with ourselves and with God. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said: “Let him who cannot be alone beware of community. Let him who is not in community beware of being alone.” There is a gift in solitude where we learn to face up to ourselves - and helps us be better friends to others.
Loneliness is another matter because it feels as though I do not matter. I am not enfolded in a family or a group of friends. There is no one to whom I am special. Or so it seems.
Perhaps I need to get out and make some friends - join a group of people who share my interest in films or golf or art of music or dancing. A mutual interest is a good basis for a mutual friendship.
But friends can be fickle. Not all friendships go deep enough to meet the deeper needs to be loved.
A wise friend once pointed out that we often look to each other for what we can receive only from God; and we look to God for what we can receive only from each other.
As Jesus approached his final days he anticipated the failure of his friends, as they would be scattered far and wide. Looking ahead to that time of loneliness he makes an astonishing claim: “You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me.” (John 16:32)
Perhaps his times of solitude with Father prepared him to cope with the time of loneliness. When we spend time alone with God, we develop an inner “cell” where we meet with God. It is a portable cell. We can enter it at any moment of the day or night - “alone, yet not alone, for the Father is with me”.
“Make us aware, dear God,
of the eye that beholds us
the hand that holds us
the heart than loves us
and the Presence that enfolds us.”
[from Prayer Rhythms for Busy People by Ray Simpson]