How Can I Stay Inspired as a Christian? Archives - Christian Questions Bible Podcast

No one wants to be lonely. It is a sad and painful state of being that daily grows more and more common. There is a major difference between being alone and being lonely. To be alone is to be without anyone to engage with. This can be a productive place to be when in the right frame of mind. On the other hand, we can feel isolated in a crowded room or when we are with family and friends. We can be lonely at work, at play and even at church. Perhaps we are lonesome when with our spouse or when engaged in social media. Loneliness is not dictated by outward circumstances, rather it is driven by our interpretations of our experiences and our perceptions of our environment. To be lonely is to feel unimportant. It is to be convinced we do not belong and that we in some way, are unacceptable and even unwanted. Loneliness can be overwhelming. Fortunately, there are ways to combat it!

If we are stuck in a lonely corner of our lives, the last thing we want to do is to let others know. Such an action is far too risky, as it brings on the anxiety of a further sense of rejection. We don’t want to hear, “Pull yourself together!” or “Get out there and meet someone!” While these statements may be meant as encouragement, they feel like judgment and enhance our fear of failure. Loneliness, therefore, is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Feeling lonely provokes actions of loneliness and expectations of continued isolation. How do we begin to  break down this destructive pattern?

We suggest five action steps for Christians. The first is prayer. Why? Prayer is a private experience. No one needs to know about it which relieves us from the ever-present sense of judgment we feel. Think about this – God ALREADY knows we are desperately lonely. He ALREADY knows how we arrived at such a state of mind. The purpose of approaching God through Jesus about our isolation is not to inform God of what is happening but to say it. The purpose is to humbly admit to our heavenly Father the extent of our misery and to place our experience into His eternally-capable hands. We begin to seek His will in coping with it.

While taking such a first step requires the courage to be honest and humble before God, its benefits can be dramatic. Understanding ourselves through the lens of God’s mercy and love can help us develop the fortitude for the next steps. Check out our April 12, 2021 podcast, “How Do I Cope With Overwhelming Loneliness?” for more. We round out the approach to and benefits of prayer.  The next four steps are introduced, seeing how steps two and three are basically private and therefore less daunting. Don’t miss this opportunity for profound and practical insight. Loneliness does not have to rule our daily life if we learn how to cope with it!

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Life is overflowing with opportunities, and I’m not talking about the big things that change your world.  I’m talking about the small and often-overlooked chances in your everyday to refocus on the good, or to simply be kind or to elevate a conversation rather than diminish it.  Many of our life experiences come from small decisions that are actually a result of indecision.  In the Old Testament, there lived a man named Lot whose life was an example of this.  Lot had faith in God and God protected him.  In spite of this, his life experiences produced much sadness, folly and cause for regret.  How did he get to such an end?  He hesitated.  He hesitated when it came to godly choices and he constantly did “almost” enough when it came to godly actions!

Life’s biggest problems really can begin with some of its simplest choices.  When Lot and his Uncle Abraham were deciding where each would settle with their families, households and flocks, Abraham gave Lot first dibs. Lot made the obvious choice of the fertile valley for the benefit of his family and flock,s but he also made a much more subtle yet life-changing choice.  While the valley would be a productive place in which to thrive, Lot for some reason was drawn to set up his tents right by the city of Sodom.

This city was a known center of evil, and yet Lot not only settled in right by it, he eventually moved his home into the city itself.  Okay, so where is the hesitation we started talking about?  Up to this point Lot did not seem to hesitate when it came to moving his family right into the lap of evil.  Sadly, all of his second guessing began when it became evident that his home and city were destined for destruction. It was in this life and death context we see how the true challenges of Lot’s choices came to the front and how they end up costing him dearly.

Lot’s choices, in many ways, can represent you and me as Christians.  Do we sometimes get careless when it comes to managing our interactions with the world around us?  Do we maybe get too curious about evil and let it creep in closer than it should?  Do we ever have clear and bold direction as to what direction our lives should go to stay safe within the reach of God and then compromise that direction?  Lot did.  While his life does show us faith, righteousness and God’s care, it also shows us double mindedness, desperation and a measure of depravity.

Check out our March 11, 2019 podcast, “Is He Who Hesitates Really Lost?” to hear the story of Lot and what it can reveal about us.  Lot, like us, was a faulty and imperfect human who fell prey to his own devices and decisions and ended up rescued in spite of himself.  Take this story to heart and learn what NOT to do!

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Peer pressure. When we say those words we typically think about teenagers, school and bad decisions and those thoughts are accurate. Young people face inordinate amounts of social pressure on a regular basis and its effects can be devastating! Here’s the thing – adults are also subject to peer pressure and its place in our lives and its effect on our lives is far greater than we might anticipate.  So, for the sake of not only our young people but for our own sake as well, what do we do about it? How do we recognize address and deal with the pressures of life that press us into compromised circumstances and bad decisions? Even more importantly, how do we reverse the process and create an environment in which positive, righteous and loving peer pressure is the order of the day?

For me, one of the most startling things about peer pressure is how old and powerful it is. Because we think of peer pressure in the context of teenagers, we get the general feeling that it is a newer concept that has blossomed within the last 40 or 50 years. On the contrary, God warned Israel about falling into the clutches of peer pressure way back in the book of Exodus when He was establishing their national system of law. In Exodus 23, God told them not to follow the masses in doing evil and not to “testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after a multitude in order to pervert justice.” God was emphatically telling His people – both young and old – the dangers of following the crowd and the dangers of participating in anything not based in fair and just thinking or action. If God was so emphatic to the ancient nation of Israel about this challenge, then peer pressure should certainly be firmly within our cautionary sights.

Its power lies in its ability to do two things:

Having laid out some of the disadvantages, let me also state that all peer pressure is not bad. The flip side of being taken down an undesirable road is the ability for it to be exerted by those of principle, integrity, and righteousness. Such pressure is welcome and valuable as it helps us to stand ever more firmly for that which is right. How do we tell the difference and how do we better stand against the pressure of the crowd towards darkness? Check out our October 16, 2017 podcast, “How Do I Overcome Peer Pressure?” and gather up what you need to stand! Try it! No pressure!

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