5/26/2021 – Pastor Brian’s Blog –
Have you ever attended a concert where everyone in the band is in their late 70s and 80s? Judy and I did, about 3 years ago, when we went to a concert for a well-known band from the sixties and seventies called “Three Dog Night.” It was a fun night, although these guys trying to pretend that they weren’t their age, was also entertaining.
Anyway… back in 1969 their song “One” made it to #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 list. The chorus went like this…
One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do
One is the loneliest
One is the loneliest
One is the loneliest number that you’ll ever do
These words may make a great song, but for the Christian, being “one” is what we should be striving for!! Jesus is praying in John 17 and we find Him praying for us in verse 20… “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.” Jesus’ prayer continues for us in verse 22… “I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one.”
Amazing don’t you think!? With all our different personalities, gifts, and abilities, God wants us all to be one: one with Him. There is no doubt that God has made us all individuals, with different responsibilities and different goals, yet within those differences Jesus still wants us to be as one.
If we are going to be honest today (and honesty is always good), God never intended our life to be about us. God’s plan always has been and continues to be, that our life is about becoming one with Him. That is why trials and struggles come into our lives, because often we tend to look at life from our agenda, from our goals and plans. Again if we were honest, there are times when our agenda, our goals and our plans, aren’t even close to what God has for us.
That is why we must go through difficult times, times like covid, the loss of a loved one, job uncertainty, a government that does not look favorably on Christians and Christian values. As God allows trials into our life, they will do one of two things. They will make us more like God or they will make us a lesser person than God ever desired for us to be.
The trials can make us more patient, more loving, more kind, more giving, more what it looks like to be one with God. Or depending on how we respond, it can make us more critical, more fault-finding, more worrisome, more stingy, more self-focused, more insistent on doing life my own way. One thing is for certain and that is that we will not remain the same during the trials that God brings our way.
Jesus prayed nothing less for us than absolute oneness with Him, just like He prayed to be one with His Father. Some of you may be far from being one with God and you know it. Please know that if you are a real child of God, He will not leave you alone, until you are on that path to be “One” with Him.
If you are “One” with God, you will clearly know and so will people around you. You won’t be cynical, or constantly complaining about how God made you or what He has allowed into your life. You will find yourself ending your prayers like Jesus did: “Not my will but Thy will be done.”
Another good way to know if you are one with the Father is how you interact with other Christians… But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. 1 John 1:7
“One is the loneliest number” when you are living your Christian life as one who has one plan, one set of goals, one focus: yours! But when you become “One” with God then you will be fulfilled, you will have joy when others don’t, you will want God’s goal for your life and the life of your family. You will want what God wants, no matter what, because you are “One” with Him.
Being one and apart from God will be lonely, but when we walk in step with God and become one with Him, it changes everything… However, as it is written: “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him”, (or are One with Him) 1 Corinthians 2:9
