It’s Monday, and you’re going about your day.
First thing in the morning: brewing coffee, making your bed, getting dressed, preparing for the day’s events.
You go to work. Sing along with your iPod and wave sheepishly at the person next to you when you’re caught doing your happy, sing-along dance.
You send and receive texts, check social media, post an image to Instagram. Have lunch with a co-worker or maybe work through lunch to get caught up after the holiday weekend.
The day winds down — dinner, maybe with friends or family, or perhaps just a bowl of cereal before you crash into bed after a long, exhausting day.
And even through all of activities of the day, even with the packed schedule, the exhaustion, the happiness, it hits you:
Loneliness.
It hits you in the gut. So unexpected, so random. So inexplicable.
No matter how busy the weekend, no matter how much fun, no matter how many people you’ve been with: it still happens. You still feel it: the twist in your heart, the sadness in your mind. That ever-present loneliness that you’ve taught yourself how to live with day in, day out.
Loneliness shows itself at various times for multiple reasons and sometimes no reason at all: loss of a loved one, feelings of insecurity, broken relationships, weather changes, unfulfilled expectations.
Growing up as an only child in a home-missions church let me experience my fair share of loneliness. Leaving church camps and conferences to go home to my small, West Texas town and church of a handful of people often left me feeling void of adventures with my nonexistent youth group. I felt jealous of the camaraderie my friends shared with their “every day friends” versus me, the “conference friend.”
I dealt with feelings of being left out, unwanted, shunned, not good enough and unmittigated loneliness for a long time until I discovered a beautiful secret.
Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.” {Joshua 1:9, ESV}
Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, the God of heaven who robed Himself in flesh and came to earth, experienced loneliness of the deepest sort. Jesus was rejected by His people, the nation that He came to save. And not only was He rejected, He was killed by them. Crucified in the most undignified manner. Of course we know the rest of the story — He was not defeated by the cruelty of the grave but instead rose again and became victorious over death, hell and the grave — and yes, loneliness, as well.
God promised Joshua, leader of the Israelites, that He would be with him and the rest of the Jewish nation. He commanded them to be strong, to be courageous, to believe in the sovereignty of His power. He promised that He would be with them wherever they went, and I also firmly believe that God keeps that promise to His people — even during times of self-doubt, insecurities and hardship. And loneliness. Yes, loneliness. Because He experienced it too. He knows that you sometimes feel your heart physically breaking. He understands that it almost debilitates you for an entire day even when you paste the smile on your face and pretend that all is well. Jesus knows that the rejection you experience hurts like nothing else; but He has promised you to go with you wherever you go.
Now as a twenty-seven year old single female busy with life and all the things it presents me with, occasionally I still get this random, yet still-familiar twinge of loneliness. But now I’ve read enough of those lovely self-help books, talked with enough females to know that loneliness is just a part of life. No one is exempt from those times of sadness — sadness that you can’t really even describe. Sadness that just doesn’t make sense no matter how hard you try to analyze it.
But I’ve come to realize this beautiful truth:
Jesus is my companion, my joy, my peace, my love, my friend.
And He will be all of that and more for you, too.
Jesus is the one who will never leave you nor forsake you; the one you can count on when friends don’t respond to text messages or phone calls, the one who loves you unconditionally in spite of your sour mood and baggage. He is the one reaching out to you and saying, “Pick me! I will love you. I will be your everything. I died for you because I loved you so much.”
Jesus is with you wherever you go; will you let Him bear the burden of your loneliness and be the one to make you smile, laugh and give purpose to your life? He is with you wherever you go; will you let Him walk with you?