Fear of Being Alone and Connecting with God

There is a lot of talk in our modern world about codependency.  And with good reason – many of us experience it to some degree or another.  I believe that in some ways it gets a bad rap.  We are designed to be dependent – God told Adam in the Garden of Eden that it was not good for man to be alone (Genesis 2:18).  Interdependency is almost a commandment.  Many of Paul’s letters tell believers to be there for each other.  And certainly, dependency on God is essential.  So being dependent isn’t bad.  In fact, if you don’t depend on others enough, you have an equally serious problem.  Where the breakdown occurs is when you lose yourself in the need to focus everything on keeping the other person happy at all times.  They actually start to become a false god to you, and it will affect your ability to worship the true God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength (Mark 12:30). 

You start trying so hard to connect with someone to avoid being rejected again that you actually get emotionally enmeshed with them.

So what is codependency and why is it such a big buzzword?  When you are codependent, you think that you are so connected to some other person that you will never be alone.  It is a coping mechanism for some pain or trauma you have experienced.  This is a broken world and we experience times when we have been abandoned and rejected in a traumatic way.  If, for some reason, you did not get the care and guidance you needed at that time to heal and process what happened, you start to look for ways to keep yourself safe.  You start trying so hard to connect with someone to avoid being rejected again that you actually get emotionally enmeshed with them.   That total enmeshment with another is what you think keeps you safe.  We saw that a couple of weeks ago with Leah.  She thought that if she could only earn Jacob’s love and capture his attention, she would be okay.

Being alone feels so fearful.

Being alone feels so fearful.  I don’t mean just being physically alone – you can feel all alone in a crowded room, an intimate gathering, or a marriage.  But for me, it is doubly hard when I literally have no one to stand with me.  It feels dangerous, risky, too wide open.  I think it is similar to what people who live in places with a lot of trees and vegetation feel when they visit a place like Montana.  Their view of their surroundings is so blocked by vegetation that they can only see a few yards around them.  Then they step out into the open plains with a clear view from horizon to horizon on all sides and it is too big – too overwhelming.  That was how I felt for a long time after losing a person I was enmeshed with. I was used to being limited.  I allowed the other person to direct everything about me.  Very few decisions were up to me.  Very few risks had to be taken and when they were, I had a safety net.  Then all of a sudden all of those trees that hemmed me in were gone.  All I could see were empty miles of life stretching in all directions from horizon to horizon.  I had no idea what to fill the emptiness with or which direction to start walking.  I had never been alone.

We walk BESIDE each other and not INSIDE each other.

What I didn’t realize is that the idea of being so connected to someone that you never have to be alone is a myth.  For all intents and purposes we live our lives in a state of isolation.  That is not to say that we don’t have connections for sure.  We not only have them – we NEED them.  Remember, we were created to be in community with each other.  We were created to walk beside each other and support each other.  It is a fine distinction, but an important one to note that we walk BESIDE each other and not INSIDE each other.  We are alone inside the shell that is our mind, body, and soul.  The only thing that gets to be so enmeshed with us that it actually dwells inside of us is God’s Spirit.

Codependency lies to us.

Codependency lies to us and tells us that if we just try hard enough and give in frequently enough and adopt parts of the other person completely enough, we will become an inseparable one with them.  We will become so connected to them that nothing and no one can ever separate us from them.  But it is a lie.  No matter how much we believe we don’t have to be alone, there are times that we face by ourselves, even if people are physically standing beside us.

I was denying the reality.

This was brought home forcefully to me a few months ago.  I had a very beloved cat who I had shared my life with for 19 years.  This was no ordinary cat.  He traveled with me, talked to me, and gave me his version of butterfly kisses when I was sad.  It was a bond that transcended species.  Then I saw the swelling appear and his eye start to water.  I recognized the symptoms – he had a nasal tumor.  I had just lost another beloved cat a few months before to the same ailment.  But I tried to deny it.  I spent 10 months spoiling him, worrying about him, denying his condition and then accepting it and grieving.  I watched with a broken heart as the slow decline transitioned into a rapid deterioration, knowing there was no treatment.  I knew from my previous experience what signs to look for to indicate that it was time to give him back to God and relieve his suffering.  They weren’t there yet, but I sensed they were close. 

There are moments that no other person has the ability or privilege to share with us.

I was invited to go on a camping trip with some friends – one of my favorite activities.  I eagerly packed my motorhome and loaded my cat, concerned for my ailing little friend, but knowing that he enjoyed exploring the new territory.  But that first night, something was different.  While he would usually have slept on my bed with me, he chose to sleep elsewhere.  When I got up the next morning, it was clear that we had reached the day when I had to give him back to God.  My friends were walking beside me. They let me take their pickup to drive the 110 miles home to my vet so I wouldn’t have to drive my motorhome.  They hugged me and prayed for me and grieved with me.  When I returned, they were there as well.  But even with all of the support that I was so grateful for, I had to walk through the valley alone.  Only God and I knew the condition of my heart, the silent prayers of anguish that I offered to Him, the broken praise that I struggled to raise to Him.  There are moments that no other person has the ability or privilege to share with us.  There are moments when the world dissolves and it is just me and God, standing on that Montana plain looking at the distant horizon and saying, “What now?”

Offering a broken heart gives God something to fill. 

What I didn’t understand before and what I cherish now is knowing that in those moments, when the grief and fear and anguish and exhaustion overwhelm us and create an isolation of pain that no other human can penetrate, we have the opportunity to worship God in the deepest and most sincere way.  Just as breaking a coconut shell in half allows you to use it to hold water, a broken heart, if we let it, can more easily hold the living water of God.  The fear and pain so focuses us that we can offer our hearts to God in a way that is truly impossible at other times.  And that is what worship is – offering our hearts to God.  Offering a broken heart gives Him something to fill. 

Denial is the infection – God is the antibiotic.

But sadly, a codependent doesn’t really have those experiences.  A codependent doesn’t get to take the bad things in life and turn them to praise, worship, and healing.  A codependent is so wrapped up in the myth of enmeshment that she denies and stuffs down the pain and hurt.  She focuses not on God, but on the pain that the object of her enmeshment is feeling.  It is so much easier to feel the pain that someone else is feeling than to feel your own.  That was how I lived my life for so many years.  When my dad died, I focused on taking care of my mom and helping her through the pain she was feeling.  I denied my own grief and anger and fear by taking on hers and trying to fix it.  But denial never heals.  Denial allows the wounds to fester and grow until they poison your entire body.  They become a raging infection that seeks to destroy your happiness, your peace, and your future.  God is the antibiotic – the Neosporin.  He cleans out and heals the wounds.  But you have to feel the wound and offer it up to Him for Him to make it better. 

Praise through pain, worship through weariness, and offer up the unimaginable.

I still struggle with this at times.  I was glad for the camping trip.  It provided me with some distraction so I didn’t have to feel the grief.  I get weary of grief – I had to go through so much pent-up grief in this journey of healing that sometimes it feels like I can’t take one more second.  Not one more.  I still fear it.  No one welcomes pain.  It would be so easy to step into my old patterns and just deny it.  But I can’t.  I have learned the beauty and immense power of praising through pain, worshipping through weariness, and offering up the unimaginable.  I have learned the sweet relief of letting my heart break and allowing pain to escape while God pours healing back in. 

God has big, big shoulders. 

Try it next time.  God has big, big shoulders.  He can take anything that you have to throw at Him and still return infinite love.  Yell at Him, scream at Him, sob uncontrollably to Him.  He sees it all as worship because He knows you are giving Him your heart.  Don’t be so afraid of walking alone that you let your desire to have human support rob you of the isolated moments of interacting deeply and genuinely with your God.  Relish the alone, even if just for a few moments.  Alone is not a time of fear – it is an opportunity to connect with the one Being who really can enmesh with you and never leave you.  The world may seem large, empty, overwhelming and unsafe, but He has every single atom of it in His hand.  He knows exactly what is over every distant horizon and which direction He wants to send you.  But you will only find it if you intentionally make yourself be alone with Him. 

Absolutely everything can be turned into praise, healing, and glorifying God.

My prayer for you today is that you can acknowledge and name your deep fear of being alone and helpless.  Of being abandoned and rejected and left without what you need to survive.  We all have that fear. Psalms 27:10 expresses it:  “When my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take care of me.”  Even David was afraid of being abandoned by those he cared about, and he experienced it in the worst sort of way when his own son, Absalom, turned against him and wanted to kill him. But David named it and surrendered it to God.  Tell Him about it.  Ask God to turn those fears and wounds into worship.  Ask Him to teach you to come to Him alone and vulnerably real.  To help you to offer all of the pain that is held in your broken heart to Him intensely, intimately, and individually.  He will pour His living water into your heart.  And finally, I pray that you will come to learn, as I have, that nothing in this life – no matter how dark or fearful or ugly – has to be wasted and regretted.  Absolutely everything can be turned into praise, healing, and glorifying God.  And then, once you have spent time with Him, go spend time with your spouse, your parents, your kids, or your friends in the healthy interdependency that God created. 

I hope today’s message touched your heart, increased your understanding, and encouraged you.  Praying the peace and comfort of Christ Jesus on your life.