separation anxiety

With my job I am required to travel from time to time. The distances are usually driving distance, but an overnight stay is required. I try to avoid the overnighters at all costs. I wake up and get on the road before 7am, drive for 3 hours, have my meetings and then drive home. 6 hours in the car is so much better than one night in a hotel. I just checked my points and membership level with my favorite hotel chain, and I found out I am only two stays away from their highest level (Diamond). Truthfully that saddens me.

I like hotels with my family. I like coming back to an icy cold room after a visit to the pool. I like everyone getting ready in the same room and then heading out for breakfast at the hotel. We eat like kings! We eat eggs, bacon, muffins, cereal, danishes, fruit and a full assortment of juices.

I don't like hotels when I am alone and traveling. I don't ever use the pool, but I occasionally use the workout facility. And the truth is I usually have a cup of coffee for breakfast and nothing else.

In the past my daughter has helped me with my travel reservations through an online portal. She helps me pick out which hotel looks best, and she picks where I will stay. She asked me one day, "Does this hotel have a pool?", I said "Yes it does." "You are so lucky!" she replied. She then asked if I was going to pack my bathing suit so that I could go swimming.

When I have to leave, and become separated from my family it hurts. There is a certain sadness when I travel. Generally, I try to stay away from the hotel room until it is bed time. I eat dinner out alone, I shop, maybe catch a movie, anything to trick myself that I am really not away. Then when I do get to the room I fire up my laptop and get to work. At home bedtime is around 10:30, on the road it is midnight.

Recently I either read a book or heard someone on the radio speaking of Jesus praying in the garden before His capture, and his anxiety over the next days.

In Mark it says that Jesus began to be deeply distressed and troubled, and He said "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Luke tells us Jesus was in anguish, so He started praying more earnestly, and His sweat became drops of blood.

Never before have we seen Jesus show this emotion. Was he in anguish over the pain he was about to endure? Maybe. I think he knew that He was about to take on the sin of the world and that His father could not look at Him with the sin, so His father would have to turn His back.

Jesus is in anguish (I think) over the separation of Himself from the Father.

Here is the deal, we are all separated from the Father. That separation is what causes the sadness and anxiety. When we are reunited with the Father through a relationship with Christ, we know the Joy and the Peace that passes all understanding.

I am still sad when I travel, but I am reminded of what Christ went through and I turn my thoughts to Him and everything just feels a little better.