Do You Feel Alone?

Do you ever feel like your prayers bounce off of the ceiling and never make it to heaven? Do you ever feel like God is listening to everyone, but you? Do you ever feel like the wallflower at a school dance, sitting on the sideline, all alone, wishing God would take notice of you? I have. It’s not a good feeling. It’s a rather hopeless feeling. Those kinds of feelings are so powerful, they actually scared me.

God takes us on many journeys in life. He teaches us. He guides us. He shows us the way. The human experience is plagued with disappointments, sadness, discouragement, and angst. Along side those feelings, joy enters in and we breath a sigh of relief until the next storm comes and knocks us down.

I felt this way a long time ago, when I was returning to college for my senior year. I came back from Alaska, leaving my twin sister behind. I had a depressing summer, recovering from Satan dancing on my head. I couldn’t shake the depression and feeling of hopelessness when I returned to school. I went to class, ate at the cafeteria, went to bed, and got up the next day to do it all again. It was like I was going through the motions of being a college student, but felt nothing. I was like a robot. I had no joy, no hope.

I hated feeling this way. I couldn’t shake it. I cried out to the Lord, but felt my prayers were truly bouncing off the ceiling. I begged God and pleaded with Him to make me feel better. Please, please, please Lord! Help me! I can’t live like this. And nothing. I continued to go through the motions of being a college student: go to class, eat at the cafeteria, and go to bed. I wondered how long I could last feeling this way. I kept praying desperate prayers, begging God to take away this depression. Still nothing.

While I felt that my prayers were truly bouncing off the ceiling, God was not absent. He heard every one of my prayers. He saw me as I was: broken, hopeless, sad, and desperate for peace. I don’t know when it was or how many times I had cried out to the Lord, before God sent three people my way to give me a message of hope and encouragement. An old friend came up to visit me and listened to me and prayed with me. A girl down the hall of my dorm, out of the blue, gave me a note that said she was praying for me and she was there for me if I needed it. And lastly, a guy in my major, stopped me in the cafeteria and told me he needed to talk to me. He sat with me at lunch and talked to me for over an hour repeating the things I had only told God about my life and how I was feeling. Towards the end of the conversation, I realized it wasn’t the guy talking, it was God talking through the guy. There was no way he could have known the things he was saying except that God was speaking through him. These three people encouraged me through a span of a few days. By the end of my lunch, I could feel a glimmer of hope. Tiny specks of peace were breaking through my heart.

When I first heard the story of, “Footprints in the Sand, “ I shivered with recognition. I had been there before, and the idea of God carrying me was exactly how I felt when God sent three people to pull me out of the depression I was in.

That’s why I love the story of Elijah so much. When he’s laying there in the wilderness begging God to take his life, I say, “Yep, I hear you brother! Been there before, I know how you feel!” 1 Kings 19:4-8

We are not alone, believer, in this world. We may feel like we are, but feelings, shmeelings. For the believer, that’s not reality. We are never alone. Never, ever. He is ALWAYS with us. He can be counted on. He keeps His Word. And He says, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5)

So take heart, dear sister. You may feel like your prayers are bouncing off the ceiling, but they aren’t. You may feel like God has left you, but He hasn’t. God will rescue you. He will lift you up. And God will restore you to a better place than when you were before. Shortly after this, I met my future husband, and we just celebrated our 28th wedding anniversary.