Hebrews chapter 13 and verse
5. Let your conversation be without
covetousness, and be content with such things as ye have. For he hath said, I will never
leave thee, nor forsake thee. And really it's just those words
at the end of that verse that I want to dwell upon this morning. He has said, I will never leave
thee nor forsake thee. You know, the Lord's people are
blessed in so many ways. And we daily experience, we daily
evidence in our lives the goodness of God towards us, his mercy
and his grace towards us. David, the psalmist, could say
in Psalm 23, a psalm that many of you, most of you, will be
familiar with. And it is such a shame when familiarity
causes us to gloss over without properly considering some of
these passages of Holy Scripture. But David says at the end of
Psalm 23, surely, surely, goodness and mercy shall follow
me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of
the Lord forever. I was up in Scotland for a few
days in the past week and we were able to visit with my father
and This was actually part of the subject of one of our conversations
when we were reflecting on the fact that we are such a blessed
people. And yet, even as we face the
challenges of this world, even as we consider our own mortality,
we reflect upon our own weakness and the weakness of our bodies
and the weakness of ageing. the reality of our imminent death. David voices for us in these
words a beautiful reality. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days of my life and then I will dwell in
the house of the Lord forever. We experience grace in life and
we shall enjoy glory in heaven. Psalm 84 verse 11 says, For the
Lord God is a sun and shield. The Lord will give grace and
glory. No good thing will he withhold
from them that walk uprightly. And don't be frightened by that
word, uprightly. Because our walk is not a walk
of righteousness. except insofar as we look to
the Lord Jesus Christ. We walk by faith in Christ. We walk trusting the Lord Jesus
Christ. We walk with an eye to the sacrifice
that he has made. We walk with the knowledge of
the efficacy and power of His cleansing blood. And as we see
His death upon the cross, and as we see the great transaction
which was effected there on the cross, it is in that walk that
we walk uprightly. For we walk in Christ by faith,
trusting him daily. And the testimony of Scripture
is this, that no good thing will he withhold from them that walk
in Christ, them that walk uprightly. And it behoves us to pause when
we find ourselves feeling sorry for ourself or we find ourselves
bemoaning our circumstances and lamenting over our lot, to remember
how blessed we are in relation to what we deserve. We're blessed. We're blessed
in this world. And someone will reply, that's
easy for you to say, because you've not endured what I've
experienced. And that's true. None of us can
entirely enter into another person's existence, nor fully know the
circumstances of another person's life. And we ought to be sensitive
to that fact. Judging one another is dangerous
when we don't know the extent or the fullness of the circumstances
of that individual's situation and indeed I think that's one
of the reasons why the history of job in the Bible is so important
so important for us to read and consider, for surely there was
never a man had to face the utter and complete removal of every
comfort in this world as Job did. And so while you would be
absolutely right to say, well, you've not walked in my shoes,
none of us have walked in the shoes of Job. And it is good
for us both to return time and time again to read about the
experiences of that man and the humility that it brought to bear
in his life as he stood before the providential hand of God. And I want to mention this morning
particularly a trial that the Lord's people often face. And I know that there are many,
and I know that we could touch upon lots and lots, but this
morning, in the context of this little title, that we're never
truly alone, I want to speak about loneliness. I believe that
loneliness is a particular trial that we have to face in this
world. And I believe that it is an issue,
it is a matter of which the Lord our God is and always has been
very aware. I believe that companionship
is mankind's greatest need. Do you remember with me that
the Lord God declared, it is not good that man should be alone? Do you remember where that was
that the Lord spoke those words? That's in Genesis chapter two
and verse 18. Now prior to that, prior to that
comment, there is no suggestion in the word of God that there
is anything in heaven or earth that is declared to be either
than good or very good. The very first time that the
phrase not good is used is in the context that man should not
be alone. So loneliness was something that
God was aware of, even in this world, before sin entered into
it, before Eve had ever fallen, before Adam and Eve had together
shared that fruit at the temptation of Satan. God could say that
it's not good that man should be alone. And loneliness is very
often a silent and a secret trial that we have to bear. By its
very nature, it can't be shared. And perhaps our loneliness is
manifested in a desire to share love. a desire to love and to
be loved, perhaps by a husband or a wife. Perhaps it's manifested
in a longing to have a friend, a confidant, a soulmate that
we can speak to, that we can share with, that we can be honest
with. And also let us remember that
you don't have to be alone to be lonely. A single person can be lonely,
but a married person can be lonely as well if that relationship
has deteriorated. And it might surprise you to
know that there are lots of examples in the Word of God concerning
loneliness. Loneliness in the Bible, although
the word lonely or the word loneliness is never actually used, we discover
when we reflect upon the stories and the histories of Bible men
and women. that many of them felt the weight
and the burden of loneliness. And what I want to do for a few
minutes is very quickly just touch upon a number of individuals
that have experienced loneliness just to perhaps open up this
message and this experience for us this morning. The first one
that I have is Abraham, and I want to think about Abraham in the
context of the loneliness of bereavement. Because when Sarah
died, it is clear that Abraham felt the loss of his wife greatly. Sarah is the only woman in the
Bible whose age at death is recorded. And Abraham was very careful
to have the circumstances and the events surrounding her death
recorded and known about in the scriptures. and he secured her
burial in a very suitable way. In Genesis chapter 23 in verse
19 we're told that Abraham buried Sarah, his wife, in the cave
of the field of Machpelah before Mamre. The same is Hebron in
the land of Canaan. You know that that cave still
exists, that cave is still known as the cave of the patriarchs
and it was a statement of the great loss that Abraham felt
in the bereavement of his wife Sarah that we have before us
here. But the loss of a spouse or a
loved one isn't the only cause of loneliness. And Moses knew
something about loneliness too. He knew the loneliness of responsibility
and the loneliness of leadership. Even those around him, people
like Aaron and Miriam and perhaps even Zipporah, his wife, they
could not support Moses under the trials of leadership, the
leadership of Israel and the waywardness of Israel that was
placed upon this great leader of the Lord's Old Testament people. And in Deuteronomy chapter nine,
and then again in verse 12, we read these words coming from
the lips of Moses. He says, I am not able to bear
you myself alone. How can I myself alone bear your
cumbrance and your burden and your strife? And parents and
leaders and employers, they may carry a loneliness in fulfilling
the burden of their role that the people around about them
may not be aware of. And as I was thinking about that,
I thought just to give you an example, perhaps especially the
burden of a lone parent. Those of us who have raised children
know that it is a demanding job at the best of times, but it
is always a blessing, a help to be able to rely on the other
parent to be supportive in the disciplining and in the directing
and in the engendering of good principles in the lives of our
children. But what of those who have to
walk that road of parenthood alone? It's a lonely journey. And that woman whose sons were
to be taken for the debt payment that she had was a woman who
had no husband. And yet we see that the Lord
sent Elisha with such a beautiful miracle there of the crews of
oil that didn't empty until she had more than enough to pay off
her debts and keep her children. What a lonely life that would
have been for the lady had her children been taken into servitude. But there is a loneliness beyond
bereavement, the loneliness of responsibility that we see perhaps
in the life of Moses. And then there's the loneliness
of, I'm going to call it generously, miscalculation. The loneliness
of miscalculation. And I'm going to use as an example
of that Naomi. We may be less charitable and
say that this is really a reference to the loneliness of sin and
the loneliness of shame and the loneliness of the mistakes that
we have made. Perhaps we need not be too critical
of Elimelech, Naomi's husband, who travelled down from Israel
into Moab during a time of famine. Perhaps we should just say, well,
he was trying to do the best for his family and for his children.
But the events and the circumstances that pertained in this situation
is that Elimelech quickly died. And so too did Malon and Chilion,
the two sons of Elimelech and Naomi. And so there, without
a father, without a husband, Naomi was left bereft. And she could say, the Lord hath
afflicted me. In Ruth, the book of Ruth, chapter
1, verse 20, she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara,
for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me. Do we ever
feel that the Lord has dealt bitterly with us? Do we ever
feel that there are consequences that have flowed from decisions
that we have made which have resulted in our life being bitter? There is a loneliness in that
sort of realisation, the loneliness of the consequences of our sin,
the loneliness in the shame that we bear for the mistakes that
we have made, the loneliness of miscalculation. And whether
it's our perverseness or simply God's providence, these things
in our life can lead to loneliness. But yet, there's something very
lovely in this story of Naomi and Ruth, because before too
long, we see here that there are seeds of blessing that rested
in Ruth, this Moabites, of whom a saviour would come and a deliverer
would arise to bring forth much fruit for the salvation of a
people. Hannah is another example of
loneliness in the Bible. Hannah knew the loneliness of
barrenness. Now there is an emptiness comes
in the loss of a child. And there is an emptiness which
flows from not being able to have a child. And Hannah suffered
deeply for years before the Lord gave her Samuel. what a blessing
and what a privilege that was for Hana and what a glory it
was to Hannah to see in the years that unfolded this little child
of hers being so blessed of God and honoured of God and used
of God in the establishment of the well-being and the rule and
the preaching of the gospel in the land of Israel. Elijah is another man who I want
to draw your attention to. Elijah's loneliness may be attributed
to his faithfulness because the prophet's loyalty to God left
him alone in the land of Israel. He found no encouragement in
the whole of the country. He found no one to fellowship
with in the whole of that land, to such an extent that he was
so downcast, so depressed, that he resolved to lie down in the
dirt and die. He would not even feed himself.
He would not drink any longer. He would simply lie down where
he was, weary and exhausted, and he would die there because
he imagined that he was the only true worshipper left in Israel. Well, what did the Lord say to
Elijah? The Lord came to him, sent an
angel to him, and declared to him, Yet I have left me seven
thousand in Israel, all the knees of which have not bowed unto
Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him. You see, Elijah was lonely. But Elijah
didn't see the full picture. He misinterpreted the circumstances
around about him. He was dejected and downcast. But he did not know that God
had reserved for himself a people. And while Elijah didn't know
that, Perhaps it wasn't for him to know that. Perhaps the dealings
of God with him required that he didn't have that fellowship
with these 7,000 that had not yet bowed the knee to Baal. And
who knows how many more there were in the land of Judah. Nonetheless, Elijah's depression
was real and loneliness has its consequences. So James in the
New Testament, the apostle tells us that he, Elijah, was a man
subject to like passions as we are. And it may well be that
for some of us here today, loneliness isn't an issue. I know for some
that it is. And if it's not for you now,
then may it be that the Lord doesn't bring you at some stage
in your life into that feeling, that place, that location of
abandonment, that place of feeling yourself utterly alone and bereft
of help and support. But there are those who do feel
like that, perhaps for some of the reasons that we have expressed. Daniel was another example. Daniel
knew something of the loneliness of opposition. There is a loneliness
that is born of persecution. And maybe that's in the home. if our spouse is not a believer. Maybe it's in the workplace,
if those that we work with rise up against us and endeavour to
marginalise us and mock us because of our testimony. Maybe it's
at school, where the school bully has discovered that we've got
a weakness. And there's an opposition that
comes, maybe because we go to church or maybe because we talk
about God. And when our enemies gang up
against us, then there is the loneliness of opposition. You know, it's one thing to be
in the fiery furnace with our friends, and Shadrach and Meshach
and Abednego, they were in the fiery furnace in Babylon with one another. And perhaps there's a mutual
support can be gleaned and gained from being in that furnace of
persecution, opposition with our friends. But it's another
thing entirely to be in the lion's den alone. And Daniel worshipped,
he opened his windows and he worshipped towards Jerusalem
despite the opposition that he faced. And the Lord preserved
his faithful servant. Daniel was able to cry out to
the king the morning after he had been thrown into the den
of lions. My God hath sent his angel and
hath shut the lions' mouths that they have not hurt me. What a
beautiful picture that is. There in the darkness, there
in the loneliness, there in the apparent trial and terror and trouble
of his state, Daniel proved the faithfulness of God, who shut
the lion's mouths that they did not hurt him. John the Baptist
knew something of loneliness. His loneliness was the loneliness
of isolation. And he was called to live in
a very frugal and a very austere kind of way. He dressed in camel
skin. Don't imagine that that's a kind
of suede leather. That's as rough as it comes. He ate locusts. I've been seeing
all these big grasshoppers in the grass as summer has ended. in Shoto in Great Falls and they're
not very attractive looking creatures. I'm sure they have their purpose.
Their big brothers the locust I would imagine are, well I don't
have to imagine because I've seen those as well, and that's
what he ate. That's what he ate. He ate those
locusts. He ate those big grasshoppers.
Some people tried to catch them to go fishing with them. Well,
John the Baptist, he had to eat them for himself. And we're told
that he ate wild honey and some people might think, well, that
sounds pretty nice, but I can't imagine that it was a very easy
job managing to get wild honey from wild bees rather than the
domesticated honeybees that are in hives in people's gardens.
But you see, this was what was required of him. The Lord would
have it thus that John should live in that isolation. There
was no king's palace for John the Baptist. The role that he
had been given, the role that he had to fulfil in this life,
the purpose for which he had been brought into the life was
a purpose of isolation, loneliness. And if John's reclusive wilderness
years were lonely in their isolation, then the Apostle Paul knew loneliness
in his ministry, because he too was called to serve Christ. And
he too was given a full appreciation of the daily risks that he faced
in doing that. The Lord said to Ananias, I shall
show him all the things that he must suffer for my sake. Paul knew that he had to suffer
for the Lord's sake. And every town that he entered,
every village, every city, every synagogue that he went into,
he knew that there would be people there ready to raise their hands
against him, ready to call him out and call him down. That there
were people, assassins, who roamed around the country seeking opportunity
to take his life. So he had to alter his journey
repeatedly in order to not cross their paths. Such was the life
that this man lived. And there's a loneliness in that
kind of ministry. But you know, There's a deeper
heart in Paul's voice when he writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy
4, verse 16. He's making reference to the
court case that he was called to attend in Rome. In fact, we've
just been thinking in the children's address about Paul being taken
into Roman custody. That was it. He's never out of
Roman custody now until he is standing in Rome in front of
his accusers from Jerusalem, in front of Caesar to whom he
appealed. And this is what he says to Timothy
in his letter to his young friend. He says, at my first answer,
No man stood with me, but all men forsook me. I pray God that
it may not be laid to their charge. And even brothers and sisters
in Christ let us down. They desert us in that moment
of need. Paul could go on to say, but
the Lord stood with me and strengthened me. You see, you have to know
the first before you know the other. You have to know what
it is to be deserted in a moment of need, to truly feel the blessedness
of the Lord being with us. And I know that some of you who
are lonely might think to yourself, I wish it was different. But
there's a beauty here in the fact that the Lord stands with
his people and strengthens them. Here's another example. John,
the apostle, knew something of the loneliness of imprisonment.
Now, we know little about the end of most of the disciples,
but we do know that John knew the loneliness of exile. He was exiled to Patmos. And what a transition that is,
from reclining on the breast of the Lord Jesus Christ, to
living in a cold, dark hole on an island. Revelation 1 verse
9 says that I was in the isle that is called Patmos for the
word of God and for the testimony of Christ Jesus. Now, I never
want to spend a night in prison. I never want to spend a night
in Great Falls jail. But here, for the testimony of
Jesus Christ, for the Word of God, John knew what it was to
experience the loneliness of exile and imprisonment. And all
these experienced loneliness in different ways and for different
reasons. And our paths may be similar. Our path of loneliness will certainly
not be unique and perhaps we can look at the examples and
the testimonies of some of these characters in scripture that
we have alluded to and draw strength from the fact that our path is
not unique. Our loneliness is not the first
time anyone has ever felt like this. That the Lord's people
from the very beginning of Scripture, from Abraham himself and the
bereavement that he felt with the loss of Sarah, down to John
who could be put in prison for the testimony of Jesus Christ
and everybody in between, whether that was isolation, whether it
was a barrenness and unable to have children, whether it was
the loss of children, whether it was the responsibilities that
we have to carry, whether it was the illnesses that we faced.
We can draw strength from these examples of scripture. But all that this does is brings
us to the highest expression of loneliness that has ever been
revealed in heaven or in earth. And from this final point, I
want to draw one simple truth and one application. The final example of loneliness
that we have is the loneliness of the Lord Jesus Christ when
he was abandoned by man and by God. The Lord Jesus Christ was
forsaken of men. He was betrayed, he was denied. His friends in the garden, they
all ran away and left him. and he was abandoned of God when
he hung upon the cross. In Mark chapter 14, verse 50,
we read, they all forsook him and fled. They all forsook him
and fled. We're talking about his disciples.
Judas, one of the twelve, had betrayed him. Peter, his friend
Peter, who had made so many daring and affectionate testimonies
with respect to the Lord, he denied him. there in the presence
of that little girl and Thomas doubted all that the Lord Jesus
Christ had said at that moment. They all forsook him and fled
and the Lord was left alone. When he was in the garden, he
asked if they would support him and pray with him and when he
returned to his three closest confidants, Peter, James and
John, he found that they were asleep. They couldn't even keep
their eyes open in order to pray with their Lord. And then in
Matthew 27 and 46, we read these words. And about the ninth hour,
Jesus cried with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama, sabbathanai. That is to say, my God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? And I think that there is an
emphasis on that word thou. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? This is a loneliness that we
shall never be called to endure. because the Lord Jesus Christ
has endured it for us. Brothers and sisters in the Lord,
we will never be abandoned by God. And while in this world
we may have to deal with the loneliness of our physical and
human interactions, we will never be abandoned by God. We will
never be left by the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is the heart
of substitution. Hell, hell will be loneliness
supersized. There will be no friends in hell. There will be no God in hell. There will be no hope in hell,
no comfort. but on the cross, the Lord Jesus
Christ bore hell for his people. On the cross, he took their place. On the cross, he carried their
sin, suffered their condemnation, bore up under that outpouring
of the wrath of God against their sin, and he, on the cross, delivered
them from it. That's the message of the gospel.
That's the message of substitutionary atonement. That is the story
of Christ accomplishing for his people those things which are
the most fearsome and ferocious that we could ever imagine. And whatever challenges we face
today, like Moses with our responsibilities, or Hannah in the opposition that
she experienced from those close relations around about her, or
all the other people that we have mentioned. We have a promise
because of what the Lord Jesus Christ has done, because of his
sacrifice and because of his blood, that we shall never be
forsaken of God. because the Lord Jesus Christ
has taken our place and he promises that he will never leave us. He died for us and we may forsake
him. but he shall never forsake us. This is the essence of our union
with the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the essence, this is
the heart of this great covenant purpose of God, to unite and
join us with the Saviour. And having been joined together
with him, we will never be separated from him, nor him from us. And
so he can say, Lo, I am with you always, not just to his disciples,
not just to his apostles, but to all his people. Even, he says through Paul to
Timothy, if we believe not, yet he abideth faithful, he cannot
deny himself. And what I'm about to say now
is not intended as a rebuke or a criticism. It is rather a call
to faith. It is a call to trust. It is
a call to humbly press our need upon our Lord. But the writer
to the Hebrews says to us in Hebrews 13, verse five, be content
with such things as ye have. For he hath said, I will never
leave thee, nor forsake thee. Now I'm not quite finished yet,
though it sounds as if I am. Because Paul says in 2 Corinthians
chapter 13 and verse 14, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you
all. Now that is not simply a closing
benediction, but it is an enduring testimony that we have in the
Word of God, written by this faithful apostle who gave everything
for the sake of the church and for the sake of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He says, The grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the
Holy Spirit be with you all. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
is the transforming power that makes this world's trials bearable. Makes the trials that we have
to endure profitable. Dare I say that grace makes the
trials of this world pleasurable? The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. We began our thoughts this morning
in Psalm 84. The Lord will give grace and
glory. And knowing the grace of the
Lord Jesus Christ assures that his glory will be ours,
and therefore we wait with patience. Having received his grace, we
wait with patience for the manifestation and revelation of his glory. Paul said the grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ and he said the love of God. The love of God
is particular. It is definite and it is powerful. It is a perfect love and it gives
no ground for fear to those who have received it. Rather, it
saves, it keeps, it protects, and it provides for all our needs. It says, There is no temptation
taken you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful,
who will not suffer you to be tempted. Above that ye are able. But will with the temptation
also make a way of escape, that ye may be able to bear it. Friends, are you lonely today? Then there is the fellowship,
the communion of the Holy Spirit. John 14, 16, the Lord Jesus Christ
says, I will pray the Father and he shall give you another
comforter, that he may abide with you forever. Even the Spirit
of truth whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him
not, neither knoweth him, but ye know him. for he dwelleth
with you and shall be in you. Paul could say, the Lord stood
with me. And Christ whispers to our hearts
in the gospel and to our souls by faith, I will not leave you
comfortless. I will come to you. May the Lord
grant us ears to hear. And now I am finished. So thank
you very much for your attendance. Thank you for bearing with me
as we've thought about the struggles of loneliness and the fact that
by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the
fellowship of the Holy Spirit, we are never truly alone.