We Need Each Other!

Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.  And let us not neglect meeting together, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of His return is drawing near.  Heb. 10:24-25

Are you familiar with the body chemical Oxytocin?  Oxytocin is the hormone released during breast feeding that gives that relaxed, sleepy feeling.  Perhaps you’ve experienced it.  Oxytocin rises during sex, childbirth, and breast feeding.  Oxytocin also counteracts the stress hormone Cortisol.  It is an anti-depressant, anti-anxiety hormone, which creates feelings of calm and a sense of connection.   

Emotional connections with others is the only way to raise Oxytocin levels.   It has been used in clinical trials to lower social anxiety and help children & adults feel more comfortable in social situations.  It helps married people live longer and recover from illness more quickly.  One researcher said that if you hung an Oxytocin meter around people’s necks, you could tell who is in healthy relationships and who isn’t.  It is indeed the hormone that helps us bond.   

Why do I tell you all that?  Because a study showed that when two or more women (specifically women) are in a room together, Oxytocin levels rise, and they rise higher depending on whether you are with a stranger or a friend.  If there is touch involved, Oxytocin levels rise even higher.   

It’s no wonder women like to go to the restroom together.  And if they go alone, you may find them talking to someone they don’t even know.  Men use restrooms for purely biological reasons. Women use restrooms as social lounges.  Men in restrooms will never speak a word to each other. Women who’ve never met may leave a restroom giggling together like old friends.  Who knew it is because of Oxytocin.

However, according to Nancy Leigh DeMoss, women today don’t take the time to cultivate relationships as they used to.  She says that, “Women are more harried and hurried and flustered than any other generation, even though we have more time-saving devices than any other generation.  The chronic state and condition of women today is, ‘Oh, (huge sigh) I’m SO busy!’   Women today have a chronic and profound sense of loneliness, alienation, and isolation.”  

A study showed that young moms have the highest stress levels, that they need a lot of help because the extended family is not in place.  We need to come along side these young women as stated in Titus 2. 

Leighann McCoy says, “The devil doesn’t care how many times we get together to eat fried chicken and sing Kumbaya, but come share your faith and pray fervently for each other, and the devil does everything in his power to distract you from doing that.”   

The devil knows relationships are built when we pray and grow in our faith together, and it affects everyone around us.  Entire families, churches, and communities can be affected, and it all starts with women.

 “Women of God have a powerful influence in the church. Great acts of faith are displayed in critical moments by desperate people willing to place their lives on the line for the Glory of God.” Leighann McCoy