How Loneliness Can Improve our Hearing

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Today I’m over at Proverbs 31  talking  about  loneliness.  You can read or listen to my devotion here. But  first, I’d love to tell you about a noisy summer’s day, an apologetic preschooler, and how loneliness can improve our hearing.

The mac and cheese had grown cold by the time my kids traipsed through the backdoor for lunch on that hot summer’s day long ago.

“Why didn’t you tell us it was time to eat?” asked my son, then nine, when he saw the table set with our bright red plates. 

He moved toward the sink to wash his hands; then promptly clutched his stomach in a dramatic charade. “I’m sooooo hungry,” he complained.

I giggled at my animated boy; then patted him on the shoulder and steered him toward the table. “I called for you three times,” I gently explained, “but you were so busy playing with your friends that you didn’t hear me.” 

Ever since our swing set had become the designated gathering place for the neighborhood posse; our backyard swelled with a  clamoring cacophony of shrieks and shouts, giggles and chatter. It was the sound of summer, and I wouldn’t have exchanged it for any other melody (even if that meant cold mac and cheese on occasion).

But my four-year-old was a sensitive soul. So, when she climbed up on the chair beside her big brother, she extended an apology instead of a complaint.

“Mommy, I’m sorry I didn’t come when you called.  I didn’t even hear you.” 

I gave her shoulder and tender squeeze and assured her I wasn’t upset.

She exhaled a sigh of relief and added, “ I guess I just listen better when I’m lonely!”

I tried not to laugh at my little girl’s word choice, but big sister couldn’t contain her giggles.

“You mean alone,” she corrected with first-grade expertise. “You listen better when you’re alone.” 

My preschooler shrugged her shoulders, unconcerned with matters of linguistics. Then she filled her mouth with a spoonful of pasta and flashed me a confident smile. “Mommy knows what I meant.”

My little girl was right, of course. I knew exactly what she meant on that carefree day long ago.

But as I look back on that quirky conversation, I realize that my four-year-old was right about something else, too.

Sometimes we just listen better when we’re lonely.

Though we long for our aching hearts to be heard and heeded, lonely seasons invite us to simply listen and be held.

It’s in my own lonely seasons that I’ve opened my Bible as a listener rather than a reader.

It’s in those lonely places where I’ve become desperate to hear the Voice of the One who knows my struggles and hears my cries.

When God’s word becomes a refuge instead of a routine, we learn the lilt of His voice and the intimacy of His whisper. And on those precious pages of ancient writ, we find a very present Savior.

My little girl was right— loneliness can hone our hearing.

Loneliness can align our faith with the pitch of God’s  promises and sync our steps with the strum of His sovereignty. 

Loneliness can quiet the dissonance of our doubts and magnify the harmonies of  our hope.

Loneliness can pull us from the clamor of the world and position us in the presence of our Savior… if we let it.

So, let’s stop being afraid of our own loneliness.

Let’s open the pages of God’s Word and allow the depths of His heart  to speak to the breadth of our needs.

Let’s invite the Word who holds all things together to hold us, too (Colossians 1:17)… until slowly,  mysteriously, our lonely places become sacred spaces.

If you’re starting 2020 in a lonely place, click on the link below and grab a free printable to remind you that you’re not alone.  Also, we’d love to  know how we can pray for you as we begin a new year. Feel free to connect with us in the comments.

Never Alone printable