How to Find Hope in Times of Isolation and Loneliness

Loneliness can lead us to search for temporary answers, but only by resting in the Creator’s love can we find lasting peace and purpose.

Today’s post is from the writings of Elisabeth Elliot, who was a missionary and one of the most perceptive and popular Christian writers of the last century.

What is to be done with loneliness? 

The world offers its poor anodynes and they are eagerly seized–“I might find the answer in the singles bar….” It is true indeed that the lonely might find a mate, someone willing to have a go at loving them, at least for a night, but is this really the answer they seek? Without a foothold, without an awareness of being a part of something grander and greater than themselves, it will not be enough. 

What Will Be Enough

It was the Love of God that brought us all into being–sun, stars, winds, men and women, and “infants to sweeten the world” (to use a phrase from an old prayer which I love). To know God, or even to begin to know Him, is to know that we are not alone in the universe. Someone Else is Out There. 

There is a hint that there may be a refuge for our loneliness. To stop our frantic getting, spending, and searching, and simply to look at the things God has made is to move one step away from despair. For God cares. The most awesome seascape can reveal a care which is actually tender.

“Who watched over the birth of the sea, when it burst in flood from the womb?” God asked Job in the midst of his great suffering, “when I wrapped it in a blanket of cloud and cradled it in fog?” (Job 38:8-9, NEB). A God who can look on the mighty ocean as a tiny newborn–could He overlook one of His lonely people? Job had felt very much overlooked. Yet, after all his questions and accusations, he was shown that not for a moment had he really been forgotten. 

“Do you … attend the wild doe when she is in labor? Do you count the months that they carry their young or know the time of their delivery, when they crouch down to open their wombs?” (Job 39:1-3, NEB). If God sees the doe in the throes of her agony and attends the delivery of her fawn in the forest, we may believe that an aching heart does not escape His notice. 

How to Grow Through Loneliness

To my father I owe a deep consciousness of God as Creator. I cannot remember a time when I was not aware of the songs of birds, the glory of mountains, the freshness of the dawn, the deep sweetness of a forest of white pines, the mystery of the night sky. He taught us to see, hear, smell, feel, taste. 

Both parents taught us in a thousand ways to know the One who made us all, and to trust Him. And they told us the story which, far more than all the glories of nature, opens the heart of God­-the story of the One “who is the effulgence of God’s splendour and the stamp of God’s very being” (Heb. 1:3, NEB), the story of Jesus, His birth to a virgin-mother, His life, His death on the Cross. When we were very small they taught us to trust Him; they sang to us at bedtime, “Safe in the Arms of Jesus.” That’s where we grew up. 

But safety, as the Cross shows, does not exclude suffering. All that was of course beyond me when I was a child, but as I began to learn about suffering I learned that trust in those strong arms means that even our suffering is under control. We are not doomed to meaninglessness. A loving Purpose is behind it all, a great tenderness even in the fierceness.

Reflection:

• Where have you looked for solutions to loneliness? Have you had success? 
• What tangible experiences remind you that God is with you? How can you seek out these experiences more intentionally? 

Were you inspired by this post? Check out the newly repackaged edition of The Path of Loneliness by Elisabeth Elliot. She gives hope to the lonely through tender reflections on God’s love and his plans to bless us. You will find honesty and compassion, not platitudes. She tackles this difficult topic with grace and faith, showing you how to make peace with loneliness, however it has come about, and how to grow through it.

Author bio: Elisabeth Elliot (1926-2015) was one of the most perceptive and popular Christian writers of the last century. The author of more than twenty books, including Passion and Purity, The Journals of Jim Elliot, and These Strange Ashes. Elliot offered guidance and encouragement to millions of readers worldwide. For more information about Elisabeth’s books, visit ElisabethElliot.org.