MY BLOG POSTS

We look at others and see so many who are smarter, prettier, richer. We see girls who seem to have it all together and we get discouraged because we are SO not together.

Just about everyone struggles with these feelings. Seriously. I can’t tell you how many girls I’ve talked to who are beautiful, stunning, yet look at themselves in the mirror and think they are the ugliest girl on the planet. Or girls who seem to breeze through even the toughest classes, but are wracked with worry every night before a big test. Sometimes the girls who seem to know everyone feel incredibly lonely and unloved.

Becoming a supermodel or a famous singer or a movie star doesn’t change it, either. Believe it or not, those folks have even more pressure than we do. Many of them struggle with insecurity to a degree that would shock most of us “normal folks.”

So here’s the deal: The problem isn’t that you’re not good enough. The problem is that you are believing a lie. That lie comes straight from the Father of Lies himself, and the way we battle with him is by using Truth – the Word of God.  Replace those lies with Truth every time they come into your mind. Every time.

Here are a few verses of Truth to start with. Memorize them. Write them on a post-it and stick it on your bathroom mirror, your bedroom wall. Fill your mind with  ”whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Phil. 4:8 Fill your mind so full of Truth that there is no room left for the lies.

Ps. 139:13-14 “For you created my inmost being;  you knit me together   in my mother’s womb. I praise you  because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful,  I know that full well.”

I John 3:1a “See what great love  the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!”

Romans 8:17 “Now if we are children, then we are heirs —heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings   in order that we may also share in his glory.”

This question was asked by a teen girl at our church. I am sure she is not the only one with this on her heart.

Loneliness can be felt in a crowd, in a large family, even by people with lots of friends, and those who seem to have everything all together.

Our family moved from Florida to Texas in the summer of 1999. We knew no one in the small town of Midlothian, other than the pastor whose church we wanted to be part of. My husband was going to seminary and working, and I was home with our then-six-month-old daughter. Talk about lonely. I had grown up in Florida, gone to college in Florida, gotten married in Florida. I had a church full of people who loved our little family and a town I was very familiar with in Florida.

I am a people person – I like being surrounded by people, hanging out with people, talking with people. I like getting phone calls and invitations to movies and dinner and just to hang out. I like going to the mall or the grocery store or to church and running into people I know. I crave community.

But when we first arrived in Midlothian, I had none of that. I didn’t even know how to get to the grocery store or the mall, forget knowing anyone once I got there. It was just me and little Emma. And lots and lots of time.

There were several months when I felt “unknown”, isolated, and incredibly alone. I was tempted to just hole up and forget it. Forging new friendships is hard. While I am a people person, I am guarded when it comes to letting people get really close. It takes me a long time to let people “in.”

God used that time to work in me, though, in many ways. First, my time with him was sweeter. He was the “friend that sticks closer than a brother.” I cried to him, screamed to him, poured out my loneliness, and he met me there. Second, our little family grew closer, as I learned to make that circle of what would eventually become five my priority (behind Jesus, of course). And I learned what it feels like to be “new.” I hadn’t really experienced that before. My precious friends at Midlothian Bible Church taught me how to make someone who feels like an outsider feel welcomed. They invited me to join them at the parks, at their homes, in their ministries. They loved my kids. They helped me through some incredibly difficult times in my life and my marriage and, six years later, they gave us the wings to be able to leave what had then become home to start over in another country.

What seemed at the time to be terrible — leaving everyone and everything I knew in Florida — ended up being the greatest blessing of my life. But I had to work past the loneliness to realize that. I had to wait on God to bring me through the valley to get to the mountaintop. It didn’t happen overnight.

So if you are feeling lonely, unknown, isolated, don’t lose hope. God brings good out of even the darkest times, the most difficult situations. We don’t always see that good – especially when we are in the middle of it. But cling to him, put your hope in him, and know that he will NEVER leave you or forsake you.