Death is a one-on-one thing

These are some very interesting thoughts on death from Anne Ortland as spoken today on Revive Our Hearts.

...one of the keys to that (being equally at ease with life and death) is getting to know the Lord one on one. If everything in your life has been “the group,” everything is “the family,” everything is “church,” everything is multiple—if we are not used to being alone with the Lord—death is a one-on-one thing. The group gets cut out. The family gets cut out. The dearest ones around you get cut out in that experience.
He must be supreme. He’s got to be Priority One, or it would simply be too . . . not only too painful, to be cut off from the others, but also it would be so unfamiliar to us. We would not know how to handle one-on-one experiences with the Lord the way sickness is.
No matter how much they love you, they cannot take your sickness for you. You realize you’re one on one with the Lord. This is what either brings glory to that situation, or it’s just a bad-news thing. I mean, pain is pain. But Jesus is the transforming power. He makes all the difference.

This quote encourages me today to spend time with the Lord building an intimate relationship with Him--not the church, not my Christian friends, not my Christian family. In the end, those relationships will not give me courage and hope in the face of death.