Be forewarned, I am typing all of this on my phone as I do not currently have a computer. Therefore, I must truncate what I have to say, and will not be able to write all that I would like.  But, I will do my best regardless.

So, I’ve been trying to think of what to write for the second part of this blog. I am very good at focusing on the dark and dismal, and, I am afraid, very poor at hilighting the opposing features.

Honestly, if you were to come to me asking for advice on how to live a life of joy or peace or faith, I would be forced to respond with only one statement, “Look to God, because I can’t help you.” And though that is the best advice anyone can give, I know that it would be the most unhelpful. Everyone knows the answer- all of us are trying to figure out how to get there.

But, here I am, and I promised you a second part, because there needs to be a second part. The narrative does not end in the agony of alone.

All of us, to some degree or another has experienced the pain of being alone. All of us are created for something more than ourselves. And that’s not only God whom we have been created for, but also for eachother.

“Then the Lord God said, ‘It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper for him.’ … But for Adam there was not found a helper for him [of all the animals God had made]. So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up the place with flesh. And the rib that the Lord God had taken from man, he made into a woman and brought her to the man.”

-Genesis 2:18-22 ESV

We were made for eachother. And many of us,  though not all, were made for the sacred bond of marriage. I claim no such promise for myself. Others claim it for me, but I remain unconvinced. But, regardless of that, we were not made to be alone. In the words of the verse above, “It is not good that man should be alone.” And I firmly believe that that word “man” applies just as easily to women as it does to men. It is not good that we be alone.

So why are all of us so desperately lonely from time to time? And for many of us, almost continually. In fact the more I hear from the lonely, the more I examine my own self,  I hear one dismal refrain- we have all resigned ourselves to our prison of solitude.

I myself believe,  somewhere in the darkness of my heart,  that though I ache and long for marital companionship,  I will most likely never find it. I am a mess. And I don’t want to force my mess onto anyone. I’ve heard the same sentiment from many others.

I can’t offer hope for you in that vein. I am no prophet. I don’t know if you are destined for singleness. I don’t know if I am.

But I do know this- Jesus knows what it is like to be alone. He knows.

Let that sink in for a little bit: He knows.

There is a beautiful song by Michael Card called “Lonely Places.” The chorus is as follows-

“Lord you walked in lonely places, you felt our emptiness. You walked in lonely places to know the pain of Man.”

If anyone knows what it is like to be alone, it is Christ. His life is one veritable saga of lonlieness, ultimatley ending with a lonely death on a tree.

But,  again, the narrative doesn’t end there. Jesus died for our sin. He lived for our sorrow. He rose for our joy.

I’m still figuring this whole Joy thing out.

I’m running out of time, and there is still loads more I want to say. Let me leave you with one more passage.

Genesis 16-

1 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. ² And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children^[a] by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. ³ So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife.⁴ And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress.^[b]5 And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me!” ⁶ But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your servant is in your power; do to her as you please.” Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her.

⁷ The angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. ⁸ And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai.” ⁹ The angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her.” ¹⁰ The angel of the Lord also said to her, “I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.” ¹¹ And the angel of the Lord said to her,

¹³ So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,”^[d] for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.”^{[e] 14} Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi;^[f] it lies between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵ And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. ¹⁶ Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram.

Take heart. He is the God of Seeing.