Did you know?

• The week before Thanksgiving in 2023, the World Health Organization declared a new global health concern, also called an epidemic. This epidemic is loneliness.
• Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who coined the term “loneliness epidemic”, notes that rates of loneliness have doubled since the 1980’s.
• Research findings have described the effect of loneliness saying that it is just as bad as smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day. It’s effects are more devastating than obesity.
• The physical health consequences of poor or insufficient connection include a 29% increased risk of heart disease, a 32% increased risk of stroke, and a 50% increased risk of developing dementia for older adults. Additionally, lacking social connection increases risk of premature death by more than 60%.
• Our new series is going to look at the modern epidemic of loneliness and seeks to encourage believers who feel isolated and lonely while also inspiring deeper community across the congregation.

Defining Our Terms

• Loneliness is a subjective feeling of being alone or separated from others, not necessarily due to physical separation.
• Psalm 13:1-2 | 1 How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? 2 How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
• Isolation refers to a physical or social separation from others. It is an objective state of having minimal contact with other people, which can be voluntary or involuntary.
• Unlike loneliness, isolation is not about feelings or perceptions but about the actual situation of being apart from others.
• Loneliness can be caused by a number and things and is a feeling that distorts our perception of reality. Isolation is both voluntary and involuntary, but is the
• God never isolates anyone. Rather, isolation is the product of sin, committed by an individual or committed against them by another.
• It is a known strategy of Satan to isolate believers from community.
• In isolation from others, darkness, sin, and the attacks of the enemy grow stronger.

Hope in the Midst of Loneliness and Isolation

• Doctrinal (Genesis 16:1-13)

// God is El Roi, the God who sees us. Wherever you are, regardless of your situation, regardless of what others have done to you, regardless of anything – God sees you.
// Psalm 145:18 | The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.
// Isaiah 26:3 | You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.

• Practical

// Luke 10:25-37 >> The Story of the Good Samaritan
// C.S. Lewis >> It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbor. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbor’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.

• Loneliness can be lessened by caring for our neighbors.
• As a community of believers, we are to care for those who feel overlooked and unseen.

Response

• Knowing what you have heard about loneliness and isolation, who is vulnerable in your life? Who is suffering from loneliness?
• How you respond? How can you cultivate your own defenses against loneliness? How will you respond when you feel the desire to isolate? How can we minister more effectively to those who have been isolated because of age, illness, and more?