Desperate And Alone

Introduction: Kurt Cobain was the lead singer of legendary grunge band Nirvana. He tragically took his own life in an act of suicide. Despite his widespread fame, great wealth and adulation as a rock star he grew terribly lonely and depressed. In the days leading up to his suicide one of his diary entries read: "Somebody, anybody, God help, help me please. I want to be accepted...I’m so tired of crying and dreaming, I’m soo soo alone."

Proposition: As we make yet another journey thought the pages of scripture, we look at the concept of loneliness and seek out what insight scripture has to give us about this most damaging aspect of family life.

Transition: This morning we begin our study by looking at what it means to by lonely, by looking at this concept called loneliness

I. THE CONCEPT OF LONELINESS

a. What is the difference between being alone and being lonely?

- Is there a difference? Yes there is a difference, being alone is being solitary, excluding all others.

- Being lonely is when you feel alone, perhaps even in the presence of others, normally accompanied by sadness due to a perceived lack of companionship

- Now we have been talking about the family, and God gives us family, so we should never feel alone or lonely right….

- That isn’t necessarily the case, many times we can be surrounded by people, our family and our friends and feel completely alone and lonely

b. Are you a person who avoids being alone?

- Most people wouldn’t know this but I am somewhat of an introvert. There are days that I just love to be by myself

- However most of the time I hate being alone

- God created us to be relational people, therefore we crave personal interaction

c. Everyone at some point in time will feel the presence of loneliness

- Listen here to the words of Psalm 88:1-7 & 18

- How would you describe the writer of this psalm? Alone, lonely, without hope? There are several descriptors that could be used

- So why do you think that such a “downer” of a passage would have a place in the bible?

- It could be there to give us hope… hope from such as sad passage… YES. We can all sympathize with the writer and him with us.

- It shows us that we are not alone in our times of loneliness, others face it as well

- What do you think about how this Psalm ends? (vs. 18) Sad

- It shows us the stark face of reality, at some point we all will feel the sting of loneliness

- Even some of the great “Hero’s” of the faith faced loneliness, we will look at a few of their stories this morning

d. Think of a time when you were lonely, how did God use that time to shape you?

- Even events that we see as negative, can have a positive effect on our life (My first ministry was just that for me)

- We could even say that loneliness can be a “gift” that we are given in order to draw us towards others and most importantly toward God

- It can show is that we need others – many times our loneliness is only broken when we reach out to serve others

- It can show is that even when we may doubt it, God is with us

- Not only is God “with” us but He is also “for” us (Joshua 1:9)

- Joshua had been called to lead Israel in Moses’ stead, not an easy task by any means, but listen to God’s words to him

- God will be with us in the same way!

- It can also show is that we are