Portraits

 

• John is a man of fifty who has just lost his wife of twenty years. They never had any children and did most everything together. John feels alienated from the friends he and his wife Jenny had together. Loneliness has overcome him.
  
  
• Mary can’t stand going to all her friends’ weddings. It is not a happy occasion for her. It has been five years since she graduated from college and she longs to be married. She spends most evenings alone in her tiny apartment.

Definitions and Key Thoughts

A Biblical Understanding of Relationship

Since humans were made in the image of a triune God (who exists in relationship), humans too were made for relationship. This is evidenced in Genesis 2:18, where God sees Adam alone in the Garden of Eden and says it is “not good.”

Humans need both intimacy with God (vertical) and intimacy with other people (horizontal). It is important to find our need for vertical (God) intimacy first, for God says, “I will not leave you nor forsake you” (Joshua 1:5), and Paul writes “nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39). In contrast, our horizontal (finite, human) relationships can be destroyed by sin, physical death, and other circumstances on this side of heaven.

When humans inherited a sin nature, intimacy was tainted: Adam and Eve clothed themselves, blamed each other, blamed God, and refused to accept responsibility for their disobedience. Through Christ, people can discover the path to genuine intimacy again.

Due to our sin nature, intimacy is difficult to achieve and people often experience loneliness.

The Nature of Loneliness and Solitude

• Loneliness is a human response to being alone because God created humans with a need for relationships. From the moment of birth, humans seek attachment and connection.
• Loneliness:
  is an uncomfortable feeling of isolation
  is a negative feeling of being disconnected from others
  causes a person to feel alienated
  happens when a person feels there is no one with whom to share joys and
  disappointments
  can result in an overwhelming feeling of sadness
  can cause a person to become despondent if nothing is done about it

Types of Loneliness

Situational Loneliness:

• A response to physical or emotional separation.
• Death, divorce, life transitions, and personal mobility are the most common causes of situational loneliness.
  
• In situational loneliness, intimate relationships are severed, changed, or forever disrupted in some way.
  
• This may be brief and contained or long term and overwhelming.
  
• The person knows there are those who care, whose support is, perhaps, only a phone call away, but the situation (a job or school) demands separation.
  
• The longing that accompanies the separation is intense and compelling.
  
• When the separation is permanent (such as through death), the loneliness is more difficult to handle.

 

Emotional Loneliness:

• Emotional separation can also lead to loneliness.
  
• People can feel lonely when they are surrounded by those with whom they perceive little or no intimate connection. The loneliest people are often in crowds.
  
• This sense of disconnectedness accentuates the loneliness and often leads to greater despair.
  
• This kind of loneliness is often felt as a form of anxiety, driving some to frantic efforts at superficial connection.
• When physical separation is coupled with emotional separation, the loneliness can seem unbearable.
  

Chronic Loneliness:

• Chronic loneliness can result from persistent feelings of not belonging or being understood.
• Chronic loneliness is often rooted in deeply held personal beliefs or social deficits.
  
• The person feeling chronically alone and isolated has no hope of “connecting” again in the future.
  
• Chronic feelings of loneliness can lead to deep personal isolation and despair, often ending in suicide or angry, violent alienation.
  

Assessment of Loneliness

Q1 Do you feel alone even when you are in a room full of people?

Q2 Does the loneliness ever go away?

Q3 When it does, what are you doing?

Q4 Describe a typical day.

Q5 Have you given your loneliness to God?

Q6 Do you feel that God understands your loneliness?

Q7 Do you blame yourself for your loneliness?

Q8 Do you have a friend you can share these feelings with?

Q9 Share another time in your life when you were lonely.

Q10 Do you remember what you did or what got you out of the loneliness the previous time?

Q11 Do you think you could change your loneliness in a similar way at this time?

Wise Counsel

• You need to understand the source of your loneliness.
  
  Perhaps your loneliness is based on a perception, not an unchangeable circumstance.
  
  Perceptions can be changed once you see the cause of the loneliness.
  
  Are you feeling lonely due to a mistaken perception of the situation?
  Can the situation be changed?
  
  
• Your loneliness may be a healthy part of a grief process as you deal with a loss. That is natural and can pass if you do not let the loneliness lead to complete isolation from others.
  
• It sounds like a paradox, but there may be times God requires you to be alone in order to move away from loneliness.
  
• The experience of loneliness can cause people to draw closer to God and to others. If we are dealing with loneliness, we need to reach out to God and to others.
  
• God will bring people into one’s life at various times. You might not always have the same trusted friend to confide in. People will come and go.
  

Action Steps

1. Recognize the Feeling

• Express your feelings of loneliness to someone else or in writing.
• Determine the source of the loneliness by putting your thoughts and feelings in writing—possibly in a journal.
  
• Try to make some social and spiritual changes to move out of loneliness (e.g., become more involved in your community; devote time to communion with God every day).

2. Seek God

• Lonely times can draw one closer to God. God wants His children to be dependent on Him for everything.
• If social relationships are still lacking, for the time being, enjoy your relationship with God. He is the closest friend you will ever have. He will never leave and never disappoint (Hebrews 13:5).
  
• Focus on the positive and cherish the fact that God has a will for each day and each stage of life.

3. Get Involved

• Join a church committee, Bible study, a community organization, support group, sport, or hobby club.
  
• Volunteer! Volunteering for some community agency is a great way to help others, and at the same time engage in meaningful relationships.
• Do more than just attend church. See if you can host a meeting, prayer group, or Bible study in your home.
  
• Search to find others who are actively seeking healthy, close, active and meaningful friendships.
  
• When at a social event, look for the person who looks loneliest and start there.

4. Be Confident

• Loneliness will be overcome in time.
• Remember that no one is truly alone if he has God.
  

Biblical Insights


I have become a stranger to my brothers, and an alien to my mother’s children.—Psalm 69:8

• Loneliness is a heavy burden; people can feel alone even when surrounded by people.
• When our courage and strength fails, when people seem to have abandoned us, we can take comfort in knowing that God is always with us. When we know Him, we are never alone.
  

 

Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand. —Isaiah 41:10

 

• God reminds His people that in their loneliness and inadequacy they need not fear or be dismayed. Why? Because He is their God and because He is with them, holding them in His “righteous right hand.”
  
• Everyone feels lonely at times. Sometimes, however, loneliness can become so desperate that it causes fearfulness. That fear, then, can draw the lonely person’s attention away from God.
  
• Feelings of loneliness can be helped. Lonely people can attend church (Hebrews 10:25), be a friend to someone else (Proverbs 18:24), listen to Christian music, and pray for God to work in and through them to take away the lonely feelings.
  

Now Pashhur the son of Immer, the priest who was also chief governor in the house of the Lord, heard that Jeremiah prophesied these things. Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the high gate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the Lord. —Jeremiah 20:1-2

• As we read Jeremiah’s prayer journal, we see into the life of an intensely lonely man. On the pages, anger, resentment, and self-loathing jostle with praise and confidence. But the fact that he continued to communicate with God meant that he knew he wasn’t completely alone.
  
• The intensity of his feelings did not obliterate the deeper reality of God’s presence. As overwhelming as his gripes and challenges were, he still found comfort in having Someone to whom he could gripe.
  
• When we think that we are alone facing the greatest challenges of our lives, the Spirit of God within us will continue to shape us and draw us out to live for God. 

Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” —Hebrews 13:5

• When people feel lonely, they feel like they don’t belong, like no one cares, unloved and unwanted. When believers feel lonely, they need to remember God’s great promise, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
  
• No matter how painful or difficult our situation, no matter how alone we feel, God is there. We can look to Him for deliverance, commit the situation to His care, and take comfort in His presence. God is always with us.

Recommended Resources

After the Boxes are Unpacked, by Susan Miller

Attachments, by Tim Clinton and Gary Sibcy

Loneliness, by Elizabeth Skoglund

What Wives Wish their Husbands Knew About Women, by James Dobson