When No One Cares

Dr. Richard L. Strauss
December 4, 1977

Ask any counselor what is the most pressing problem which is plaguing people in our day, and in all probability, the answer he will give you is loneliness. Loneliness.

Now, being lonely is not the same as being alone. I want to talk about loneliness today, but maybe we better make that distinction before we even get started. Some people can be alone and still find fulfillment and satisfaction and perfect contentment in life. As a matter of fact, meaningful solitude can be a very, very valuable thing to us. Solitude can lead us to a new sensitivity to other people, and it can lead us to new creativity and living. Being alone is not bad. It can be a very good thing.

Loneliness is not physical, you see. Loneliness is emotional aloneness. Not physical aloneness, but emotional. And it can be experienced anywhere, even in a crowd. Some of the loneliest people in the world live in our largest cities. They live in crowded apartment buildings. They ride crowded subways. They walk crowded streets. They work in crowded office buildings and factory buildings. They watch ball games in crowded stadiums. Yet somehow, they feel like they're all alone.

We may even attend a crowded church, and this one's getting pretty full this morning. A crowded church and we feel like we're all alone, like we're without a friend in the world. There may be people all around us, but we just don't feel like we're a part of them. We don't really know them, and they don't know us. They don't know what's going on inside us. They don't know what we really think about things. They don't know what we're really feeling deep down inside. They don't understand our feelings. They don't really listen to us when we try to explain to them our feelings. As a matter of fact, we get the feeling they don't really care. We exchange social amenities Sunday after Sunday. We talk about the weather and other innocuous subjects such as that. But still, there is that gnawing feeling that we're really alone, all alone.

Loneliness is no respecter of persons. It touches the rich and the poor. It touches the extrovert as well as the introvert. And that may be good news to some introverts who think maybe they're the only ones who are alone. That's not true. It touches the beautiful as well as the homely. It touches the very intelligent as well as the very average person. Loneliness touches the winners as well as the losers. It is no respecter of persons.

1. Loneliness Hits David

It touched a brilliant, handsome, athletic, spiritually minded young man whom God had chosen to be the next king over Israel. And he wrote a whole psalm about it. It's Psalm 142. It says in the title: "Maskil of David: a prayer when he was in the cave." Now, the word maskil means instruction. This is a prayer. And yet, though it's a prayer, God put it in His word for our instruction.

a. Pray in Times of Loneliness

We need to be taught how to pray, particularly in times of loneliness. And this psalm ought to help. It says it was written from a cave: a prayer when he was in the cave. David was in a cave several times during his life, but most Bible scholars seem to feel this was the time he was in the cave of Adullam, back in 1 Samuel 22. We talked about that not too many weeks ago in studying another psalm. He went there shortly after he returned from the land of the Philistines, where he had gone to seek refuge from Saul and where he had feigned madness, you remember.

There he was in that cave. Saul was stalking him. His life was in constant danger. At that particular point in his life, his popularity among the people seemed to be waning a little bit. He was feeling pangs of guilt for that last episode in the land of the Philistines where he tried to seek refuge. Things were not going very well, generally speaking.

David was a little down. He was hated, he was hunted, he was discouraged. He was disheartened, and he was all alone. What's he going to do? How is he going to face his loneliness?

Well, the first two verses of the psalm give us the statement of David's plan. Here's what he's going to do. He says, "I cried unto the Lord with my voice. With my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication. I poured out my complaint before Him. I showed before Him my trouble."

David's strategy is to pray. Pretty good strategy. You ought to try it sometime. It really works. These verbs in these two verses are actually present tense. He's saying, literally, "I cry unto the Lord with my voice, I make my supplication. I pour out my complaint. I show before Him my trouble."

And that damp, dingy cave becomes a prayer closet. And those cold stone walls begin to resound with the heartfelt cries of this man of God to his Lord.

There are four statements in those two verses, and they all say pretty much the same thing. They say, I'm praying to God. I'm crying out to Him. And the emphasis of every one of those statements is on the Lord.

Did you notice that? I cried to the Lord. Unto the Lord, I made my supplication. I poured out my complaint to Him. I showed before Him my trouble.

Forsaken by all others, David directs his plea to God. And he did it out loud. Did you notice that? "With my voice," he says twice in verse 1.

Did you ever pray out loud? I have found that articulating my thoughts in prayer, at least moving my lips in a whisper, if not with a loud voice, is a tremendous asset to effective prayer. It keeps my mind on what I'm saying. You can't daydream when you pray if you pray out loud. One of the greatest hindrances to effective prayer is letting our minds wander. And we don't realize we're wandering sometimes for four or five minutes. Then we realize, boy, I haven’t been praying for the last four minutes here. I've been sitting here or kneeling here, and my mind's been on something else.

If you pray out loud, that won't happen because as soon as there's no more noise in the room, you know you're not praying anymore, and immediately you're jolted back to prayer. It's a great help and administers strength to our own hearts and lives as well.

Do you feel lonely? Do you feel forsaken? Pray. That's what David did. And I would suggest you try doing it the way he did it: praying out loud. Now you're going to have to get by yourself and close the door in a room somewhere, but you'll find it a great blessing to your life.

b. Hold Nothing Back

And David didn't hold anything back when he prayed. He frankly poured out his complaint to God, he’s saying. Complaint. That word refers to his troubled thoughts. We all have times when we feel troubled and anxious within, don't we? Agitated and irritated. Sometimes we don't even know what's bothering us or why we feel so stirred up inside.

And too often we use that inner agitation as an excuse for being irritable with other people, and it causes tension and conflict with them when we unload all of our frustrations on them, and it's so unnecessary. They can't understand why we're lashing out at them, and in all probability, they can't do anything about it anyway. It's so foolish.

"Cast thy burden upon the Lord and He shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved, to be shaken" (Psalm 55:22).

In other words, to get all shook up. Cast your burden upon the Lord.

"Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you" (1 Peter 5:7).

"Come unto Me"—Jesus is speaking—"all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." (Matthew 11:28)

Come unto Him.

He says, "I showed before Him my trouble." That word trouble has the idea of narrowness and tightness. David's in a tight spot, and he's not telling God about it because God didn't know about it. God already knew all his problems. He knew the spot he was in. He knew how lonely he felt in those moments.

But God still wanted David to tell Him about his troubles, and He wants us to do the same. God wants us to tell Him—probably more for our good than His good. Letting it out sometimes relieves the pressure, and it's encouraging to know that somebody cares enough to listen to everything we have to say.

David's strategy is to pray. That's his plan. He's a smart man. We ought to try it too. The statement of David's plan: he's going to pray.

c. David’s Problem is Despair

Now, I want you to look in verses 3 and 4, please, to the specifics of David's plight. He's about to zero in on the problem now. He's going to tell us what the difficulty really is. The first thing he says is that his spirit is overwhelmed within him. That is, he's sinking down into despair. There's a cloud of gloom around him. There's a heavy fog settling in over his spirit.

Did you ever feel that way? If you did, and you're a Christian, you probably got a load of guilt on top of your gloom because you know that spiritually-minded Christians are not supposed to get depressed. And your guilt only made your gloom more intense.

Isn't it encouraging to know that the greatest hero of Hebrew history had his moments too? Not that we would glory in his depression, but it is an encouragement to us, since he's a man after God's own heart and he had his moments. He could kill a lion and a bear single handedly. He could slay a giant of the Philistines without batting an eye. He could stand before whole enemy armies unafraid all by himself.

And yet, in Psalm 142, he finds himself in a pit of despondency. "When my spirit was overwhelmed within me," he says, "then Thou knewest my path."

Even then, David is conscious that God is watching over him and knows his path even in those moments of lonely despair.

Now, one of the things that concerns him at the moment is that somebody has laid a trap for him. He says in the last part of verse three, "In the way wherein I walked, have they secretly laid a snare for me." A trap. I don't know definitely what that trap was. In all probability, it was one of Saul's treacherous schemes to find him and to kill him. And David needs some help. He needs somebody to help him.

"I looked on my right hand and beheld, and there was no man that would know me. Refuge failed me. No man cared for my soul" (Psalm 142:4).

He looks all around to find somebody who will lend a helping hand, anybody who cares enough to minister to his needs at that crisis moment in his life. And he says he finds absolutely nobody. He says, "No man cared for my soul." Nobody cares whether I live or die. When it says no man cared for my soul, it means "for my life."

I've heard this verse preached on as if the heathen are crying out to us and saying, no man cared for my soul. While that may be true in some cases, and we need to be encouraged and challenged along those lines as believers, but that's not what this psalm is saying. This is David saying this, not the heathen. He's saying nobody cares whether I live or die. It sounds like he's feeling a little sorry for himself, doesn't it? Well, he is, but the fact remains that's the way he saw it at the moment, and it was very real to him, and nobody could convince him otherwise. As far as David could see, at that moment, there wasn't one single person who really cared. Nobody. "No man cared for my soul."

You know, that's the essence of loneliness right there. Psalm 142:4. "No man cared for my soul."

Loneliness is the fearful suspicion that we really do not matter to any other living being on this earth. Nobody really cares. Whether we live or die is of no concern to any other living being. And even if we did die, probably nobody would even come to our funeral. That's loneliness. It may not be true, but nobody can convince us to the contrary at the moment.

With David, we cry out from the very depths of our souls, "Nobody cares! Nobody really cares."

Now, I have to say at this point that sometimes we bring this plight on ourselves. We don't realize it, but in some instances, the isolation and alienation we feel may be the result of our own unwillingness to reveal ourselves to others for fear of criticism or rejection. We're sure that people won't really like us if they ever find out what we're really like. or what we're thinking on the inside, or what we're really feeling deep down. So we hide it all. And then we begin to wonder why nobody knows us or understands us or cares about us.

I'll tell you what you're going to find out. If you begin to reveal yourself, your thoughts and your feelings, who you really are, you're going to find that people can identify with you because they have the same problems you have. They're really no different. And you're also going to find that they'll probably be willing to love you and accept you in spite of your weaknesses and failures. And they may even pray for you and encourage you during your times of failure. And then the church becomes what God intended it to be all the time: a caring community of believers with people sharing their hurts and their needs and their problems with one another, encouraging one another and praying for one another.

And that, friends, is what dispels loneliness. God wants us to open up, to be honest about our needs, to tell somebody where we hurt, to stop trying to mask our weaknesses behind a facade. You know, you do that and you may find out that somebody really does care after all. And that while you thought nobody cared, they do. Somebody does care.

Now it's also possible—not always the case, but possible—that nobody cares for us because we haven't really shown any care for anybody else. That does occur sometimes. We fail to see that we are needed as much as we need. It could be because of plain old selfishness, or it may be because of a low self-image and low self-esteem, and we're saying to ourselves, "Nobody really needs me. I can't do anything. I can't say anything that would be of any help or comfort to anybody else. Who would need me?" It may be that.

But in either case, whether selfishness or a low self-esteem, we've put ourselves out of touch with other people and we've maintained a stand-offish kind of attitude. And we wonder then, why people don't come around when we need them. It may be that we haven't ever reached out to them.

Do you want to shake the lonelies? Do you want to get rid of loneliness and despair? Reach out to others. Give of yourself to them. Show genuine concern for their needs.

And if you get hurt in the process, try again, because that's what God wants you to do. Reach out to others. Sometimes we do get hurt when we do that. Sometimes we share something, and it backfires on us. That can happen. But we've got to keep trying, because God wants us not to be masking those things, but to be honest.

I don't mean offend people. I don't mean just blurt out everything that's in our minds. But I mean not pretend that we're really hurting down on the inside, that we're not hurting when we really are. Be honest.

You know, taking some positive steps like this is going to help. Other believers can help, too. And we need to be sensitive to one another in our needs, and particularly in our loneliness. We need to reflect God's love to people who are lonely. Reach out to them. Lend a listening ear. Lend a helping hand.

That was David's problem right here. Nobody was there to help him. And I'll tell you, this is the time of year [December] when we need to be doing that more than any other time, because it's during this holiday season that people who are alone feel the emotional pangs of loneliness more than any other time of year. We need to open our homes to them and let them know we really do care.

d. The Ultimate Answer to Loneliness

But the ultimate answer to loneliness is not even that. Us reaching out to others, and others reaching out to us: that's going to help. But that isn't the ultimate answer. The ultimate answer is in the next section of David's prayer, where he tells us the substance of his plea.

"I cried unto Thee, o Lord. I said, Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living" (Psalm 142:5).

"Thou art my refuge and my portion." Since no man seemed to care, David was driven to God. He had nowhere else to turn. And anything that focuses our attention on the Lord and forces us to Him can't be all that bad, can it?

So loneliness really turns out to be a good thing in David's life. And it may be a good thing in our lives. You see, in verse 4, he said, "refuge failed me." Now he says, "Thou art my refuge."

It's actually a different word in Hebrew, but this one means his place of hope. Thou art my place of hope. And that word portion, "my portion in the land of the living. That word means his highest good and his most prized possession.

David may not have had any human friends, but he had the greatest friend of all, one who would never leave him. And he's going to hang on to that friend as his most prized possession in life, and he's going to do it as long as he lives.

That's what it means in the last phrase where it says, "In the land of the living. Thou art my portion in the land of the living." "As long as I live, I'm going to hang on to you, Lord, as my highest good and greatest possession."

Now here's the greatest defense against an attack of loneliness. It's getting to know God as our highest good and our most prized possession. When we really discover who He is and what He wants to do for us and what He's really like, we can never again feel like we're all alone and like nobody cares because we'll know He cares.

And He can fill the emptiness in our lives, and He can add joyful purpose to living. He cares. Get to know God.

You know, God revealed Himself to the nation Israel in one of their moments of fear and despair and loneliness. It's back in Isaiah, chapter 41, if you'd like to turn to it. It's one of my favorite verses. That's why it's your memory verse for the week, because I already knew it. That helps. It's really an advantage to be able to be the one who picks the verse for the week out, isn't it?

This verse is one of the most comforting and encouraging promises in all the word of God to people who are lonely. It's got many other applications, too. It's Isaiah 41:10.

It has many other applications, too, but it has a definite application to loneliness. These people were being put upon by foreign powers. They thought their lives were about to end. They were in a moment of despair. They thought God didn't care. And there wasn't anybody who would stand with them and fight for them. And God speaks to them.

"Fear thou not, for I am with thee. Be not dismayed, for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee. Yea, I will help thee. Yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness" (Isaiah 41:10).

God is with us. God will help us. He's going to do it with His right hand. That's the hand of power. It's also called here, the hand of His righteousness. And that probably means His faithfulness to His promises. God isn't going to fail you.

Maybe you think you're all alone and nobody cares, but that's not true. God is with you and He cares. And when you really get to know Him, there's no way you can feel anymore that you're all alone and nobody cares.

"Fear thou not, for I am with thee. Be not dismayed, for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee. Yea, I will help thee. Yea, I will hold thee up with the right hand of My righteousness." I'll tell you, meditating on that verse can sustain us through our loneliest hour.

2. Loneliness Hits Paul

You want to meet a man who was all alone? Turn over to 2 Timothy this time, chapter four. I'll show you a lonely man: the apostle Paul, in the last hour of his life.

The pathos of it is described in graphic terms in this chapter. He's imprisoned in Rome for the second time. His trial is imminent. He's certain that this will be the end of his fruitful life and ministry. The emperor Nero is going to see to that. In verse nine, he says to Timothy:

"Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me" (2 Timothy 4:9).

There is the first hint that he's alone. "Please come, Timothy. I need you. Please come to Rome." In the next verse, we find out somebody else who he thought was a friend had forsaken him. "Demas hath forsaken me."

"Having loved this present world and is departed unto Thessalonica. Crescens took off for Galatia, and Titus is gone to Dalmatia. Only Luke is here." For some reason. Luke wasn't a great comfort to him at this particular point. "Pick up Mark and bring him along, for he's profitable to me in the ministry" (2 Timothy 4:10).

"Please come. Bring Mark. Demas has run off and left me."

"Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil. The Lord rewarded him according to his own works" (2 Timothy 4:14).

Not only was he all alone, but somebody had committed a grievous wrong against him. But the climax of this is in verse 16. Listen.

"At my first defense, no man stood with me, but all men forsook me. I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge" (2 Timothy 4:16).

I don't know where Luke was on that occasion, but for some reason, he either couldn't be there or wouldn't be there. Nobody stood with him. Everybody ran off.

Now, this first offense was probably that preliminary examination by a Roman court that would precede the actual trial. And Paul says that not one person had the courage to stand up and testify for him. I would imagine he looked out over that crowded courtroom for one friendly, familiar face, and he could find none, absolutely none. And his heart must have sank within him until he remembered:

"Notwithstanding, the Lord stood with me and strengthened me, that by me the preaching might be fully known and that all the Gentiles might hear. And I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto His heavenly kingdom, to whom be glory forever and ever" (2 Timothy 4:17).

It may have been the lion of loneliness. "The Lord stood with me," and He was really all Paul needed. He didn't need anybody else when he got right down to it. "The Lord stood with me."

Now, maybe you feel like you're all alone. Maybe worse. Maybe in your loneliness, somebody's trying to take advantage of you like they were Paul. Maybe they're treating you unfairly or accusing you falsely or misjudging your motives.

Oh, dear child of God, learn what David learned. Learn what Paul learned. Learn what other great men and women of God have learned through the ages:. that God is with you.

3. David Sets His Eyes on God

God is with you. Get to know Him. Let Him be your most prized possession and greatest treasure as long as you live. And the loneliness will be gone.

Go back to Psalm 142 for a moment, will you? David continues to pray in verse six.

"Attend unto my cry, for I am brought very low. Deliver me from my persecutors, for they are stronger than I. Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise Thy name" (Psalm 142:6-7a).

He sees his lonely plight as a prison. But notice his motive for seeking deliverance from that prison of loneliness is to give God all the praise and glory. You see it? "Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise Thy name."

Maybe you see your situation this morning as bondage. Maybe loneliness and despair hold you in with their chains, and maybe the walls of your own house are like a prison to you, and you see no way out. Do what David did. Turn to the Lord.

Ask Him for deliverance from the prison of loneliness. And if your motive is to glorify Him as David's was, you can count on God to answer. You can be sure that He will if your motive is to glorify Him. He may not change your plight in life, but He'll dispel the loneliness when you get a glimpse of Him.

I want you to look at the last half of the last verse, for in it we see the surety of David's prospects. When he gets his eyes on the Lord, it straightens out his entire perspective. And he realizes all of a sudden that people do care. And it will be but a short time until he sees the evidence of their loving concern.

"The righteous shall compass me about" (Psalm 142:7b).

"I'm going to have people around me very soon," David says, and beside that, best of all," "Thou, Lord, Thou shalt deal bountifully with me." And the people did come.

Do you want to see the record of it? Go back to 1 Samuel, chapter 22.

"David therefore departed from there"—that's the Philistines area—"and he escaped to the cave of Adullam; and when his brethren and all his father's house heard it, they went down to him" (1 Samuel 22:1).

Right there after that semicolon is probably when David wrote psalm 142. He says in that psalm, you remember, "The righteous shall compass me about." And that’s what we read.

"And when his brethren and his father's house heard it, they went down there to him. And everyone who was in distress and everyone who was in debt and everyone who was discontented gathered themselves unto him, and he became a captain over them. And there were with him about 400 men" (1 Samuel 22:1b-2).

Now, admittedly, it was a pretty motley crew. Distressed debtors, discontented. But they were with him, and they looked to him for leadership, and they loved him. And through this little crew of men, this mini army, David begins to move.

And God does deal bountifully with him and ultimately brings him to his throne and unites the entire kingdom under his rule, and honors him before all of his people. That's what David said He was going to do even in his moment of despair. "The righteous shall compass me about, for Thou shalt deal bountifully with me."

Let me tell you, the prospects are good for people who handle their loneliness as David did: by focusing their spiritual eyes on the Lord and by getting to know Him as their greatest and highest good, and most prized possession, as long as they live.

Won't you turn your eyes from the problem and fix them on Him today? That's how the service of worship began. Do you remember? "Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace." Suddenly you may begin to see the loving concern and care of other people around you, and God will deal bountifully with you.

Trusting Jesus as Your Savior

You know, the loneliest figure in all human history was probably the Lord Jesus Christ. As He faced the reality of the cross, He agonized alone in the garden. He stood alone before Pontius Pilate. His friends forsook Him. And then He suffered the pain of the whole world's sins. Separation from His father. And He did it alone. He cried out in anguish, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?"

That's loneliness. And Jesus bore it for you and for me. He went to that cross to deliver us from the lonely torment of hell. He bore it in our place. And now the debt is paid. And God says all we need to do to assure ourselves of His forgiveness and His acceptance, for eternity, is to admit our sin and turn to Him in trust.

Put our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His sacrifice on Calvary's cross in our place, and He'll give us everlasting salvation. Won't you trust Him? Let's pray.