I was meeting with a young man yesterday, and he told me about a survey that revealed 60% of young ladies who are in a relationship already have a backup boyfriend in mind.

That’s about the most compelling evidence for how much we fear being alone. When 6 out of 10 people in a relationship are already making plans for what to do after that relationship, we may have a problem.

It’s not that we should like being alone — after all, God made us for relationships and community. In fact, the Bible emphasizes that family is the God-ordained remedy for the lonely (see it for yourself in Psalm 68:6), so we never have to think God wants us to feel lonely.

But another verse does reveal that we don’t have to be afraid of lonely places or lonely seasons.

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Two words was all it took to bring my devotion to a stop, and me to tears.

The women had gone to the tomb, and as Mark tells it, they were starting to wonder how they’d get into the tomb. After all, the stone was heavy, and the strongest in this band of Jesus followers who may have been able to help weren’t there.

They had long since run away, and as we learn from other narratives in the scripture, had locked themselves away in a room hoping that the last few days had just been a fever dream.

Especially the one Jesus had appointed to lead. That one? He’d crumbled like a cookie, more than stood like a rock.

Clearly, Peter had experienced a particularly rough few days. There was the whole “Jesus called me satan” episode, then the rebuke after he’d tried to defend Jesus by cutting off an attacker’s ear, followed by the regret of having denied Jesus not once, but three times.

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This may blow your mind, but it’s impossible to “play it safe.” We can try to “keep it safe,” but the minute we start talking about play, it has to involve risk because the original word for “play” meant “to risk, chance, or expose oneself to hazard.” In fact, author Diane Ackerman dove even deeper into the original meaning in her book, Deep Play, when she wrote that “play’s original purpose was to make a pledge to someone or something by risking one’s life.”

Clearly, the meaning of the word “play” has evolved, and I’m glad that recess no longer has to include dying, but I think we’ve lost something if we’ve forgotten that playing does include risking.

This is a foreign concept to our participation trophy culture, but the point of playing isn’t just to have fun and not keep score; there is also an element of pushing ourselves to the limit in hopes of victory. Of course, this also means that we have to risk the agony of defeat, as well, and I would suggest that’s the biggest reason why the modern era has worked so hard to find a way to play without having to risk feeling the sting of loss.

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