
“I feel so isolated”.
That’s what I said to a friend of mine several years ago while visiting for a few minutes after church. Little did I know that even deeper isolation was on my horizon. It wasn’t the first time in my life I had felt alone and disconnected, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last.
Looking back, I can now see that I’ve been relatively lonely my entire life. (Wow, maybe that’s why God designed me to be an introvert; makes it a little easier to bear!) I grew up in a very small, very rural town. My church had oh, 5-10 young people at any given time. Five of them were my siblings and me. So, spiritually, it was a fairly lonely place.
College was a reprieve. I had several friends and one “kindred spirit” friend (who I’m going to spend a weekend with very soon!).
Then I got married. And we moved a lot. (I mean a LOT!) Sometimes I was lonely because we were again in such a rural place that it was difficult to find friends at all, let- alone friends of the same faith. Other times we were in a more populated area, with healthy churches even. But it was difficult to make my way into the solidly formed friendships that existed there. Other times we just didn’t stay in one place long enough for friendships to take root.
When I made the comment to my friend about being isolated, we were in a healthy church, but things were changing. The landscape of the homeschooling community within that church was changing, and I was finding myself without the support system I had grown to appreciate.
Not long after that, the true isolation began with a very difficult pregnancy and then three years of stress, worry, and almost no sleep. We still don’t really know for sure what kinds of things our son was going through. $7,000.00 worth of doctor visits revealed very few answers. All we knew was that this boy cried more often than not, and very rarely slept. Sadly, we got a lot of advice in those years but very little help, making the isolation that much more painful.
I don’t tell you all of this to make you feel sorry for me. That would do me no good. I tell you so that you’ll have a point of reference; so you’ll know that when I talk about being isolated, this is what I mean. Just lonely. Doing life with all of it’s worries, struggles, and things to learn… alone.
It’s hard. And I’ve asked God so many times to make it better. Send me a mentor. Let me have a social community. Do something to make the mundane have meaning.
As I look back on the different seasons of isolation that I’ve walked through, I can clearly see ways in which God has worked in my life not just in spite of the isolation but through it.
He changed my perspective on what a friend looks like.
During those times of isolation and loneliness, I spent a lot of time reading books by beautiful Christian women, like Elizabeth George and Sally Clarkson. As I was struggling against the loneliness, with a desperate desire to have Christian mentor, God showed me that for those times my mentors and friends were the authors of those books. I was able to sit at the feet of these godly women and learn from them, because they had taken the time to write, and I had the time to read.
He gave me time and space to focus on my relationship with my husband.
We spent our free time together. We depended on each other for comfort, fun, and everything else you typically get from your social circles. Not that I ever looked at him to fulfill all of my needs. I know that only God can do that. But I looked at him as a real person in my life and not just a business partner.
And then there were the first three and a half years of Josiah’s life. They were hard, I’m not gonna say they weren’t. But even in the midst of it all, I saw some lifelong blessings.
We never had to hurry.
Those three years were a gift to my children and me. Because we had very few places to go, we are very seldom in a hurry. (You don’t go far when you get about 3 hours of interrupted sleep a night and your child cries all day.) I can only remember one time that Josiah was crying to be held and I had to let him sit alone and cry because I had to get us ready to go somewhere. Very likely it was a doctor appointment considering how often we went to the doctor, and nothing else on my schedule had a specific time attached to it. Any time he wanted a story or wanted me to play with him, I was able to drop what I’m doing and spend time with him. Why? because I’m wasn’t filling my day so full that I didn’t have time to stop and take in those moments. I’ll never regret the time I spent holding him, reading to him, singing to him, praying for him, and yes, begging God for help.
We focused on each other.
Lydia and I talk all throughout the day. We have a strong, open relationship and I have to credit some of that to the fact that we’ve been together so much and that we both have time to share our lives with each other. I don’t mean to imply that we should be so “family focused” that we don’t see the needs and the blessings around us. Just that by not having any outside engagements, we were able to make important connections within the walls of our home. When those connections are solid, we’re more effective in The Kingdom.
I spent many hours in prayer.
When you’re up six-ten times a night, sometimes for an hour or more, there really isn’t much to do but pray. I prayed through the songs I sang to my sweet boy to try to settle him. I prayed in the silence, and through the tears. I prayed not only for myself and my family, but more than ever before, I had plenty of time and quiet to pray for others. I’ll never try to claim that I got to a point that I was grateful to be awake most of the night. But I did come to the point that I was grateful that even in my circumstances, God was still able to use me as I submitted to Him in prayer and interceded for loved ones.
The more I contemplate loneliness and isolation, the more I learn about How God can use our pain to bring about good things. And in all of this loneliness, I’m realizing something else about being alone.
It’s often where the people in the Bible were when God got their attention and then worked through them in a mighty way.
Right away I think of people like Moses, David, Nathaniel, Ruth, Joseph, and Paul. I wondered if I was just making connections that didn’t exist so I could feel like I’ve found some consolation for the loneliness that I’ve felt. So, I went to Facebook and I asked my friends and readers who they could think of in the Bible who was alone when God worked through them. Here’s what they came up with in just a short amount of time:
(I’ve included names I mentioned above if someone suggested that name in the comments.)
Noah
Abraham
Adam
Hosea
Moses
Elijah
David
Esther
Daniel
Arron
Hagar
Peter (when the rooster crowed)
Zaccheus
Samaritan woman
Naomi
Ruth
Jonah
Jacob at Beth El
Samson
Leah
Mary
Joseph
Nehemiah
And then there’s Jesus.
Wow. I’m thinking there is definitely a connection here.
God may want to get you away from it all to get your attention. He may need to get you into the wilderness so you’ll see his burning bush, that awesome plan He has for you and only you. You need to be away from the chaos and noise of your busy life so you can hear what He is saying to you
- Maybe He wants to teach you something.
- Maybe He just wants you to draw back from the things you’ve been doing and get a fresh perspective.
- Maybe He wants you to be still and look to Him for friendship and direction instead of the people around you.
- Maybe He has a work to perform through you that he couldn’t do if you were busy with lots of people and activities.
- Maybe He wants to show you that being quiet and even alone can be a good thing.
- Maybe He wants to show you how to open your eyes to the people outside your comfortable circle. Not just so you can serve them but so you can see that you can have valuable relationships with people you might have overlooked if you had never found yourself feeling isolated.
- Maybe He knows you need different people in your life and the only way you’ll cooperate is to get your away from your circle for a while, or maybe permanently.
- Maybe He wants you to learn to be empathetic to those people who are even more isolated than you are, so you’ll know how to reach out to them.
- Maybe He wants to teach you how to help someone in need (a little less advice, a little more practical help.)
I’m not suggesting that God makes you lonely on purpose. But what if your loneliness is the very place where God can teach you what He can teach you nowhere else, use you like He can use you nowhere else, and prove Himself to be your one and only source for life?
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Photo courtesy of Dan; freedigitalphotos.net
This is an amazing post! I’ve battled loneliness as well and have learned that it can be cripple me if I’m not focused on Jesus. My times of isolation have ALWAYS drawn me closer to the Lord. I believe He has made me lonely intentionally, at times, just to get my attention. Looking back on those times, I can see God at work. I’m sure Job understood this as well.
Andrea, I love that God makes the best of any of our circumstances (Romans 8:28). I pray that I will continue to look for the ways that He is working in my struggles instead of spending so much energy trying to get out of the struggle!
Wow! This was so encouraging! I feel like I have been in this place for such a long time. Your points are exactly what I am trying to learn in my heart. And it is amazing the people who God worked through and proved faithful too in the Bible
Alyssa, I’m so blessed that what I had to say was helpful to you. I know that I haves such a deep need for connectedness, we all do. But I needed that to be tempered by these truths that God showed me. As usual, I doubted that what I was learning would be useful for anyone else. But I nervously hit “publish” anyway. So glad I did! Thanks for coming by and I pray that God will continue to help both of us get these truths from our heads to our hearts!
I LOVED this post! I am feeling a little isolated myself, so it was so encouraging to see such a long, long list of people who were alone when God worked in their lives, including Jesus! Wow! So good!
Interesting list isn’t it? It gave me a lot to think about. I’m glad it encouraged you!
This is such a wonderful post! This is definitely a key area for so many women, and I love how you pointed out God’s grace even in the hard times. I’ve been in this season many times, and I can whole-heartedly agree with every point you made. Thanks so much for sharing!
It saddens me to think that this is a problem for many women. What have we done to ourselves that we are so busy and so alone?
Thanks for taking a minute (or 5?) to read my thoughts, I do hope they are a blessing to those who need it!
Beth, thank you so much for this post. My husband and I have been talking about this lately.We have always had friends, though not a lmber. This is the first time in our lives that we feel disconnected and alone. Except for a few supportive relatives, we seem to have lost those close to us in a major time of need.
My husband was diagnosed with a neurological disease a year ago and may be facing job discrimination due to his disability. I have had to go “no contact” with my emotionally abusive mother because after 46 years of taking it I can take no more (she has Narcissistic Personality Disorder and delights in hurting me.) Yet, through all of this, I have been drawing closer to God. I’ve been praying for guidance and I feel a peace that God will bring us to a new place in our lives (maybe even geographically) and show us more clearly what our purposes should be. It
almost seems that in the past year, God has been
pruning our lives, even cutting out certain people like my own a usi e mother, because he is preparing us for something. I am trying to trust Him!
Kelly,
I’m so glad you stopped by today and that God has ministered to you. I’m sorry about the pain you and your husband are going through. This is a time when you most need friends, it’s so hard when you lose friends instead. I know that sometimes people don’t know how to deal with extreme difficulties so they back away. I’m not sure if that’s happening but I’ll pray that God will send people your way who aren’t afraid of your problems or feel like in order to be your friend, they have to be able to fix them.
Keep holding onto that hope that God is in this pruning and that He will use it for your good!
Thank you, Beth. It really helps just to know someone is out there praying for me.
I like your blog. May God continue to bless you as you use it to minister to others.
Kelly
I am reading this in 2021. 7 years after you posted it. I just want to let you know that this post spoke to me. I have been trying to find other Christian women that have struggled with this that has shared it openly and I found yours. Thank you. I am definitely in a season of loneliness, and as a single woman I don’t really have anyone to go hang out with. I go to movies by myself, shopping by myself, I haven’t went out to eat by myself yet though haha. Thank you for this post and sharing your story with me.