For Christian Loners
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00:00:04.880 | Joe in Pompton Lakes, New Jersey writes, "Pastor John, on Facebook you recently said,
00:00:09.120 | 'Christ did not die to create saved loners. He died to create Christ-exalting friendships.'"
00:00:16.560 | Can you please explain this? A lot of Christians are loners. Many of them are hurting, perhaps
00:00:21.680 | victims of the church, perhaps they're victims of the lies that they believe. How would you
00:00:25.600 | encourage or motivate Christian loners? There are a lot of Christian loners, some by choice and some
00:00:33.040 | not by choice. And my point was, God's aim in the death and resurrection and work of Christ today
00:00:45.760 | is to move people beyond that stage. If they're in it, if you're in a stage where you are a
00:00:53.600 | Christian loner because you want to be, or you're a Christian loner because you feel like people have
00:00:59.760 | given you no choice but to be, God sent his Son to change that. He wants to move you,
00:01:06.960 | not just to be a soul-satisfied friend of Jesus, but to be a soul-satisfied friend to friends,
00:01:20.240 | so that you experience Jesus through others as well as directly. And here's where that came from,
00:01:26.480 | Tony. I preached a few months ago from 2 Timothy 4, where Paul said, "At my first defense,
00:01:35.120 | no one stood by me. Everybody deserted me, but the Lord stood by me and strengthened me." Now,
00:01:44.320 | you could take that verse and say, "See? He didn't need people. Jesus was his friend. Jesus will
00:01:51.200 | never fail. People will always fail you. I'm tired of dealing with people. They're just fickle, and
00:01:56.720 | they let you down. And I'm going to be like Paul and have the Lord stand by me. And if everybody
00:02:03.360 | forsakes me, that's their problem. I've got Jesus." That is totally not what Paul experienced in that
00:02:11.840 | chapter, because he said just a little bit later to Timothy, "Do your best to come to me before
00:02:20.320 | winter." And he said a little earlier, "Luke alone is with me. Get Mark. Bring him with you. He is
00:02:27.280 | useful to me in the ministry." This is Paul's heart in all of his letters. Paul hated being
00:02:33.200 | in ministry alone. When he was forced to go alone to Athens, first thing he did was send back,
00:02:38.320 | "Please get Timothy and the team down here as soon as you can. I don't want to be here in this city
00:02:43.200 | by myself." And so I think it stands that Christ died so that we would not be Christian loners,
00:02:57.680 | but would be in Christ-exalting friendships, because if you say, "Why?" It's because there's
00:03:05.040 | more of Christ to be known in Christ-exalting friendships. You know, I don't want to twist
00:03:11.360 | the arm of a loner and say, "You ought to do this, and it's your duty to do this." I want to say,
00:03:16.880 | "You're missing something, really missing something. There is more of Christ to be known.
00:03:22.400 | There's more of God to be known. God said to a happy man, 'It is not good for you to be alone.'
00:03:30.640 | And Paul said to a church, 'The eye can't say to the hand, "I have no need of you." The head can't
00:03:37.920 | say to the feet, "I have no need of you."'" They can't. And if you're a head or an eye or a hand
00:03:43.440 | or a finger or pinky or big toe standing off by yourself saying, "I don't need them," you're wrong.
00:03:48.560 | Paul says you're wrong. So here's my encouragement. First of all, to the loners who think they don't
00:03:56.400 | need others, I would say you're kicking against the pricks. God has more for you, much more of
00:04:04.240 | himself than you will have on your own. And the thing I'd say by way of encouragement to the
00:04:11.360 | Christian loner who feels that he or she has no choice, that they've been kicked into loneliness,
00:04:20.080 | I would say, "I'm sorry for what has happened to you. I'm sorry that that's been done to you."
00:04:30.000 | And I would say, "Please, don't give up on the one never-failing friend because other friends
00:04:37.280 | have failed you." And I would say, "For the sake of Christ, forgive those who have failed you.
00:04:47.200 | Unforgiveness is suicidal. It hurts you more than it hurts them." And I would say,
00:04:53.040 | "Move toward a Bible-preaching church with the prayer that God will guide you. He has a community
00:05:01.520 | for you. Trust him for this." And I would say, finally, "Be, be for others what you long for them
00:05:12.240 | to be for you." Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for listening to this podcast. Please email
00:05:17.040 | your questions to us at askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org. At DesiringGod.org, you'll find thousands of
00:05:22.400 | other free resources from John Piper. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening.
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