Lonely? It Means You're Awake.
Thoughts on "the central and inevitable fact of human existence"
Twentieth century novelist Thomas Wolfe said that the central and inevitable fact of human existence is loneliness.
Whether we are introverts or extroverts, married or single, standing on a stage or sitting in a balcony, preaching sermons or listening to love songs, we all share in the longing and struggle to connect.
But why is loneliness so pervasive?
Why do so few escape its grip?
Why does feeling lonely seem like the norm?
We experience loneliness not because there is something wrong with us, but because there is something right with us. We know deep down that we were made for more connection, intimacy, and love than we experience. We also know feeling lonely is not how it’s supposed to be.
Scripture agrees.
As the first chapters of Genesis reveal, when God created the universe, he declared it all very good (Genesis 1:1-31). But God still saw something missing with creation—just one thing preventing his perfect world from being complete. “It is not good,” God said, “that the man should be alone” (Genesis 2:18). It is striking that God declared this negative assessment in Paradise, before sin entered the world! God’s perfect creation still had one missing piece:
Adam had no companions.
As the image of God, we humans are likened to our Lord who is both One and Three—the Triune God of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is one of the great mysteries about God—he is an inseparable, eternal, intimate, and affectionate community. If we, who are made in his image, remain islands unto ourselves, if we keep our relationships on the surface, if we push others away to a safe distance, we will struggle to thrive. We cannot be vitally connected to a God who is One and Three while remaining disconnected relationally from each other. He has made us for community, not for isolation; for interdependence, not independence; for warmth and receptivity, not for coldness and distance.
The answer God provided for Adam’s loneliness in Paradise was Eve, a come-alongside companion, a “helper corresponding to him”(Genesis 2:18).
Scripture reveals high regard and honor for those called “helpers.” In fact, the other main character in Scripture who is given the name “helper” is God as he strengthens, protects, and provides for his people. Together, Adam and Eve would share life and serve God’s purposes. “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27, 2:18).
When Eve is presented to Adam for the first time, Adam’s artistic inclinations emerge, and history’s first love poem is composed:
“This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’ Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” (Genesis 2:23-25)
A surface reading of these verses may tempt us to think that the answer to our loneliness is marriage and that those who aren’t married are incomplete.
This reading is flawed for several reasons.
First, as millions have discovered, sometimes the deepest loneliness happens inside a marriage. This is especially true when a husband and wife isolate from each other and struggle to communicate, apologize, and forgive. Marriage is not a “magic bullet” that cures the loneliness problem.
Second, if it were true that only married people can be relationally complete, we would have to conclude that the Bible’s foremost teachers on marriage—Jesus and the Apostle Paul—were lacking as humans.
But they weren’t. Paul celebrated his singleness because it freed him to focus on kingdom concerns without distraction, even declaring that for those who are able, it is best to remain single (1 Cor 7:8). Jesus, also unmarried, was complete from the beginning as the image of God. He is “the image of the invisible God” and “the exact imprint of (God’s) nature” (Col 1:15; Heb 1:3).
Even so, Paul and Jesus recognized that it was not good for them to be alone. Each became deeply tethered to others, nurturing and enjoying an abundance of friends including both men and women. Paul took traveling companions with him nearly everywhere he went. In every town he visited, he developed deep, lasting friendships. Many of these he would mention affectionally by name in his New Testament letters.
As for Jesus, he had twelve male companions—the disciples. This included his most intimate circle of Peter, James, and John. He also had meaningful friendships with women including Mary, Martha, Mary Magdalene, plus others.
If Paul and Jesus needed friends like this, why wouldn’t we?
The need is universal because even in Paradise, and even if you are God, it is not good to be alone.
Bonhoeffer, sensing death was close imprisoned as he was by the Nazis, knew this truth of loneliness. Yet in this poem he articulates its redemptive power, the last lines ones of hope and triumph of faith...
Who Am I? by Deitrich Bonhoeffer
"Who am I? They often tell me
I stepped from my cells confinement
Calmly, cheerfully, firmly,
Like a Squire from his country house.
Who am I? They often tell me
I used to speak to my warders
Freely and friendly and clearly,
As thought it were mine to command.
Who am I? They also tell me
I bore the days of misfortune
Equably, smilingly, proudly,
like one accustomed to win.
Am I then really that which other men tell of?
Or am I only what I myself know of myself?
Restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage,
Struggling for breath, as though hands were compressing my throat,
Yearning for colors, for flowers, for the voices of birds,
Thirsting for words of kindness, for neighborliness,
Tossing in expectations of great events,
Powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance,
Weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making,
Faint, and ready to say farewell to it all.
Who am I? This or the Other?
Am I one person today and tomorrow another?
Am I both at once? A hypocrite before others,
And before myself a contemptible woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army
Fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?
Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, Thou knowest, O God, I am thine!"
It's about time someone wrote about singleness and debunked the lie that marriage is the answer to loneliness and that we are not complete unless we are married. Maybe you would be so kind as to write about marriage being an idol in the church today and a way of avoiding the uncomfortable teaching of how to live a celibate life.
Thank you, for sharing the truth. It's hard to find these days. 🙏👏👏