You’ve seen the stories before. Something bad leads to something good. The man who is in the terrible car wreck, then winds up falling in love with and marrying his nurse. Happy ending to a story that starts off bad. The person who gets tied up in traffic and misses their flight, only to find out that the flight has crashed. Suddenly, all the cussing they were doing while in traffic is replaced by prayers of thanks.

Maybe you’ve even lived one of these stories out yourself.

You got lost, but wound up at a better place than what you’d been shooting for. You arrived late to a sale and found what you were wanting marked down even lower. You went into the doctor over a minor complaint and the doctor found that you needed serious attention elsewhere. That one doesn’t sound like a good thing at first, until you realize that if you hadn’t gone in for the minor pain they wouldn’t have discovered the major problem until it was too late.

Such stories lead us to ask, “Was it the hand of God?” To the person who was spared the plane flight, it seems like a gift from God; but someone may ask, “What about the people on the plane? Why didn’t God spare them?”

How can we answer? Is an answer knowable to our human minds?

Still and all, when I think about such things I think of the old line, “The Lord works in mysterious ways.” I don’t know where that phrase originated from. It’s not in the Bible. The closest I could find to it—in concept if not in wording—was Exodus 33:13, “Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” (ESV)

Moses is asking God to let him get to know God, so that he can find favor in God’s eyes. How many times have we said that the Lord worked in mysterious ways, meaning that we’re glad he worked for us? Moses had it right: I don’t understand you God. Please let me understand so that I can get closer to you. Moses knew that his only successful path was not self-discovery, but God discovery.

I worked that verse in—“sorta sideways” you might say—but I want to take us back to where I started: when something bad turns into something good.

One of the most prominent Bible stories along those lines is the story of Joseph. If you remember, Joseph was sold into slavery by his 10 jealous older brothers. Years past, and when a drought hit the land where the brothers lived they went to Egypt for help. There, they found their brother—who they figured dead—was in charge of the food distribution. After their father (Israel) died, they were afraid Joseph might take revenge on them, but instead he said …

Genesis 50:20
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. (ESV)
Max Lucado tells the story of a friend of his who worked at a pharmacy while attending UT. Every four days or so, the man would deliver a big bottle of water to this elderly woman who lived nearby. With that water, she did everything. She cooked with it, heated some up for bathing, washed her dishes, even flushed her commode.

She didn’t have city water. She could have. City water would have only been $15 a month whereas these bottles were costing $50 a bottle. Why the bottle over city water, then? Because no one delivered the city water. She was willing to pay $50 a bottle just to have human contact.

In Jesus’ day there were (it’s estimated) 250 million people in the world. Now, we’re into the billions. And people are more lonely than ever.

David knew loneliness.

Psalm 25:16
Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted. (NIV)

Or read Psalm 6, sometime, if you want to see a picture of a lonely man. David was the king, with plenty of generals and courtiers and all that around him (not to mention 9 wives and more kids than the Partridge family), yet he still knew loneliness.

That’s because loneliness doesn’t come from being alone, it comes from feeling alone. There are people who are lonely in a crowded mall. There are people who work in an office full of people and that’s the loneliest place in the world. Some people come to church and sit on a pew full of people and still feel alone.

Remember the bags we’ve been talking about? The bags we carry around? They are marked “fear” and “guilt” and “shame” and “death”. Many people—maybe you—carry a really heavy bag marked “loneliness”. And you’d like more than anything to set it down.

What if I told you not to? All these other bags we carry I’ve been talking about how we can set them down, turn them over to the Shepherd (our Lord) and walk on unencumbered. What if I told you not to set down the bag of loneliness but to carry it higher? What if I told you to hug it and thank God for it?

In the nursery here there are speakers so that Isabell (or whoever is working in the nursery) can hear the service. One day when Martha was in there I must have said something that made everyone laugh. Martha heard the laughter, but not what I had said. Then Lauren, who had heard the laughter as well, told Martha, “Mister Sam’s talkin’ kwazy!”

Right now, you’d probably agree with her. Hug your bag of loneliness? Be thankful for loneliness. That is kwazy!

There’s a story from WWI of a French chaplain who taught all his soldiers a simple, five-finger exercise. “The Lord is my shepherd” he taught them, emphasizing each word by ticking it off on their fingers. “The” – there’s only one. “Lord” – he is in charge. “Is” – always was, always will be. “My” – God is personal. “Shepherd” – He will take care of me and lead me home.

Following a battle, one of the chaplain’s soldiers was found dead. When they found him, with his left hand he was clutching the index finger of his right hand. In death, he was trusting in his Lord.

In death, that soldier had been blessed with loneliness. Blessed? How can I say that?

That soldier had realized that, when all was said and done, all that mattered in his life was who he ended it with. The same is true for us. Loneliness can be an incredible blessing if in it we are taken to God’s presence. No friends. No relatives. No water delivery boys. Just us and God.

Acts 17:26-28
From one human being he created all races of people and made them live throughout the whole earth. He himself fixed beforehand the exact times and the limits of the places where they would live. He did this so that they would look for him, and perhaps find him as they felt around for him. Yet God is actually not far from any one of us; as someone has said, 'In him we live and move and exist.' It is as some of your poets have said, 'We too are his children.' (GNB)

The blessing of loneliness is to be reminded of what David said in Psalm 23:4, “You are with me.”

It’s terrible that we have to go through loneliness to get there, but that’s the way we are. We don’t remember to brush regularly until we get a couple cavities filled. We don’t remember to eat right until we start feeling weak. We don’t go to the heart doctor for a check-up until we start feeling chest pains.

We don’t turn to God until we have no one else to turn to.

But thank God he’s still there when we do turn!

Are you lonely? Then praise God, because you are not alone and there is someone who wants to provide you what you’ve been looking for—what you need!

What do I DO with this?

Take some time to be alone. Connect with God (through prayer and his word).

Thank God when you’re lonely.

Comments? Email me at martha917@yahoo.com