Hope for a Love-Starved Heart

Dannah Gresh: When you find yourself being lonely, it’s a reminder of your need for a relationship with God that will never end. Here’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: And so that homesick heart, that lovesick heart, that love-starved heart has an empty place that was made for God. That’s why, by faith, we can turn our hearts toward Him and say, “Lord, I cry out to You. You are my refuge. You are my portion.”

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Lies Women Believe, for Wednesday, August 10, 2022. I’m Dannah Gresh.

This week we’ve heard a very practical message from Nancy called, “Lies Women Believe about Themselves.” Yesterday we heard how the cruel words of others can sometimes lodge in our hearts and tempt us to believe lies. But the truth of the gospel and the power of God’s Word is everything you need to counter those lies.

We’re going to stay on that theme today. Nancy’s talking with a sweet sister named Wanda who’s been listening to this series along with us.

Wanda: I was born in a family of eight. I was the seventh daughter of my dad. I had a brother that was thirteen months old. My dad died when I was four, so I don’t remember anything my dad said to me. My mother did well with what she had, and God was first. Everything about our life was God. I mean, it was God everywhere you looked.

The one thing that I struggle with right now is, there were a lot of people that made fun of me. There were a lot of people that ridiculed me. And there were a lot of people that put me down, called me stupid, called me dumb. I would just snuff it off. It was okay.

But there was one person in my life that was kind to me. He showed me the father figure here. And for some reason, I don’t understand what God’s doing here, but this is the one person I’m not allowed to visit. I’m not allowed to see. I’m not allowed to talk to. I can talk to these people–any of them that made fun of me. I can go back to any of those. But this one person I can’t. I can’t go back.

I don’t know, but this one thing here in my life is what has drawn me to God. I mean, it’s like, I don’t have a father. I don’t have a father figure, but I have God. And it’s this process that has drawn me to God.

When I can’t sleep through the night, I get up, and I search the Scriptures. I pray. I pray day and night, even to the point that I have even been asked to leave the prayer room.

It’s gotten so desperate. I mean, I don’t know what’s going on here. I don’t. I don’t understand what God is doing, but I want to get past this. I want to get past this so bad that I’ll do whatever God wants me to do in order to get past this. I want Jesus Christ to be my very best friend. I want Jesus to be my one and only. I want that more than I want anything.

Nancy: Anything that makes me need God is a blessing. Anything that forces me to look upward to Him to get my needs met is a blessing.

Listen to Psalm 142. This is a prayer of David when he’s in a cave running from an insane king who’s jealous, who’s threatening his life, saying all manner of evil against him. From that cave he prays. He says:

I cry aloud to the LORD;
   I lift up my voice to the LORD for mercy.
I pour out my complaint before him;
   before him I tell my trouble.

When my spirit grows faint within me,
   it is you who knows my way.
In the path where I walk,
   men have hidden a snare for me.

A snare can be the snare of words that are said, or the snare of words that aren’t said which we wish would have been said. Then he says,

Look to my right and see, no one is concerned for me.
I have no refuge;
   no one cares for my life. (vv. 1–4)

Now, that may or may not have been literally true. Sometimes the enemy makes us think that’s true when it’s really not true—like Elijah saying, “I’m the only one left here.”

And God said, “You’ve overdone the pity thing. There are those who do care.”

But it’s possible that a person could be a place where that is literally true. “I have no refuge. No one cares for my life.”

What’s the very next verse say?

I cry to you, O LORD.
   I say, "You are my refuge,
You are my portion in the land of the living.

Listen to my cry,
   for I am in desperate need;
rescue me from those who pursue me,
   for they are too strong for me." (vv. 5–6)

Some of those people who are too strong for you may have been people from your childhood, and they’re not even here anymore, but they’re still pursuing you. Those words are still haunting. That lack of affection is still lodged deep in your soul.

And he says to the Lord,

Listen to my cry,
   I am desperate.
Rescue me from those who pursue,
   me for they are too strong for me.
Set me free from my prison,
   so that I may praise your name.” (vv. 6–7)

That’s the objective. It’s not about me. It’s not about my feelings. It’s not about me being loved. Ultimately, it’s about being able to praise God, to bring Him glory, to reflect His love to our world. The motive is so that I can praise Your name.

Now, David is saying, “Lord, I believe I can glorify You better if I’m not a prisoner to these thoughts, these emotions, these circumstances, so set me free from my prison.”

Now, I don’t know that the biggest prison David needed to be set free from was free from King Saul, or free from that cave. Because the fact is, he could be pursued by Saul, and he could be a fugitive in that cave, but he could still be free. Or he could be out of that cave, and King Saul could be dead, and David could still be a prisoner in his heart.

You see, the prison is really ultimately one of our own making. And he’s saying, “Lord, set me free from that inner prison, that bondage to believing lies, to being so attached to the love and affection and affirmation of others that I can’t live without it.”

Now, how do you get set free from that prison? You’ve got to find a new master, a new prison to live in so to speak. That’s where we say, “Lord, gladly I will be chained to You—Your affection, Your affirmation, Your view of me, Your Lordship in my life. That is what I crave. That’s what I’m bound to. That’s what I worship.” And when you’re a prisoner to Him, you truly are free.

We’re going to be chained to something or someone. We’re going to crave someone’s or something’s response to us. We’re going to worship something. And ultimately, I think many of us who are in bondage to people who said or did things that have hurt us deeply, really, they have become our idol. We worship that person. That’s why we crave their response. We crave them to bless us.

And thank the Lord if you had a mom, a dad, who did give you that blessing, but don’t worship it.

And for us to go through life craving for, demanding, always striving after that which some of those people in our lives may never be capable of giving us . . . some of them are not even living anymore, and we’re still in bondage to them. We’ve made them our idols. We’ve said, “I’m going to bow down and worship you until you bless me.” And they can’t hear. They can’t speak. They can’t bless. They cannot meet our needs. That’s why I’ve got to get rid of those gods (lowercase “g”) in my life by replacing them with the true God.

David did the right thing here. He poured out his complaint before God. He was honest with God; he talked to God about it. And he said, “Lord, I have no refuge here on earth, but I do have a refuge. I cry to You, O Lord. You are my refuge. You are my blesser. You are my gift. You are my lover. You are my soul’s home.”

All of that longing that we have, after the blessing, the affirmation, the acceptance that we may never receive from a parent or from a friend or a sibling, or whatever, is really just tell-tale evidence that we were made in the image of God, that we were made to be loved and to be blessed, but that we’re seeking it in the wrong places.

That unfulfilled longing should really press us to Him. We have no home here on earth. We have no refuge here on earth. We have no true love here on earth apart from God. So that homesick heart, that lovesick heart, that love-starved heart has an empty place that was made for God. And that’s why, by faith, we have to turn our hearts to Him and say, “Lord, I cry out to You. You are my refuge. You are my portion. You’re enough.”

If I have God’s love and His acceptance and His love and His blessing in my life, what other portion could compare? If I could get the blessing and the affirmation of every human being in the whole world that matters to me, it would be diddly-squat next to the portion I have in Him. But we’ve had our eyes on ourselves and other people for so long we’ve lost sight of the one whose blessing is supreme and the one whose blessing ultimately matters.

So David said, “Listen to me. Rescue me. Set me free.” And two things happened.

Then he said, “I’ll praise Your name.”

And listen to the end of verse 7 here:

Then will the righteous gather about me
because of your goodness to me.

Can you imagine becoming the kind of person that other women of God would say, “I want to be around that woman because she is so blessed. She has so much of God’s goodness in her life”?

When we get so filled up with Him, then we’re not going to be these demanding, empty-hearted, groveling, pained people who have to always be having a fix from someone else to fill us up. We’ll be so filled with the goodness of God that the righteous will gather around us because they know that God has been good to us. And out of our fullness, there’s overflow that blesses them.

The goal isn’t just that we get filled up. The goal is we get filled up so that we can give Him glory, so we can lift up glory to Him, and so that we can overflow His goodness into the lives of others.

Dannah: That’s Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. She’s been pointing us to the truth of God’s Word to counter lies we’re tempted to believe about ourselves. She writes more about that in her classic book, Lies Women Believe and the Truth That Sets Them Free.

Maybe you’ve listened today and realized that some words spoken by others over you have kept you in bondage. It’s time to be free, and this book will help.

You can get a copy of this book when you give any amount to support the ministry of Revive Our Hearts. It’s just one way we can say “thanks” for helping us spread the message of truth to women across the world. And we hope this book frees you from any lies you have been believing, and I believe it will do that because it’s based on the Word of God.

Now, yesterday we had some friends here to discuss how we live out these truths day by day. How do you remind yourself of the truth when there are so many temptations to fall for lies? Well, my friends are back.

Laura Booz is the host of the podcast, Expect Something Beautiful. And Erin Davis is the host of The Deep Well podcast. Both of them are part of the Revive Our Hearts podcast family. They’re here to reflect on what we’ve just heard.

Guys, listen. I’ve got to go first today because, as Nancy was talking, she said we need to be the kind of women that the righteous will gather about us. And when she said those words, they made me think of the two of you and how I’m so thankful for the impact you’ve had in my life. You’ve been with me in the trenches, when the lies have hammered my heart with terrifying pain. I’ve gotten to jump in the trench for you when you’ve been in those places of deep loneliness. You are some of the righteous ones that gather around my heart and my life. Thank you for being that.

Let’s do a little bit of sharing that friendship, that fellowship, with our friends here at the table with us today. What do they need to do if they’re not experiencing that in their life right now?

Laura Booz: Pray. I think that God is so good at fixing up friendships that weren’t on our radar at all, people that we wouldn’t look at and think, That person probably struggles with the same thing. But He does.

I remember one time I was struggling with something and thinking, Nobody would ever understand this. He pointed out this little, old lady at church. “Go talk to her.”

I was, like, “Lord, of all people, she would in no way relate.”

I walked up to her, and I said, “I just have to ask . . .” She was, like, “Oh, I know exactly what you mean.” She was able to give me good counsel and prayer, brought everything into the light, and it was extremely freeing. God alone knew that friendship had to be made, that connection.

Dannah: Sometimes it’s just having the courage to go there and say . . . Let’s list some of the things, okay? Some things I’ve struggled with as a young adult woman, I was so ashamed of my sexual sin from my past. I didn’t believe there was a single woman in my church who had a story like mine. I felt so unusable and so lonely. A lot of times it is our sin that makes us lonely.

 

But there have also been times when I feel lonely because the Lord is blessing me with opportunities and talents and gifts, and I feel like, “Nobody is going to understand. They’re going to think I’m just complaining if I say I feel the weight of this; I feel the burden of this.” Would somebody teach me how to say “no” and when to do it?

You just have to go up to someone and say, “I feel like I need to share my burden with you, my struggle with you.” And you find, oh, we’re not as different as you might think. Those godly, old women that Nancy talked about yesterday, they’ve been where we are, where we have been.

Erin Davis: Well, loneliness doesn’t always come out of hurt. I’m in the middle years, early forties, four kids at home, work at full throttle, aging parents. I mean, I just feel like life is a sandwich, I mean, like the really full part of the sandwich. It can just be really lonely because there’s no margin, there are a lot of people that need a lot from me.

And, of course, my friend circle is women who are in a similar state of life, for the most part, so it can be a little bit like, “Oh, I hate to call her and see if she has time for a walk today because I know she’s up to her eyeballs.” Or it could just be a capacity and hours-in-the-day issue when we find ourselves lonely because we don’t have time to connect—or really, we don’t make the time to connect.

Dannah: Hmm, making the time to connect. I just had that thought. Was it yesterday? No, it was today. It was today. I got my hair done today. It was a good thing.

Erin: Woo hoo!

Dannah: Generally, I take my laptop so when my color . . .

Erin: It takes time.

Dannah: It takes time. But I thought, Today, I’m just going to pay attention and be present. And I felt so connected, talking with that woman that was applying the color to my hair. This young woman—we have very little in common. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t know Jesus. But we had a rich, meaningful conversation. And I thought, Oh, it’s so good to prioritize conversation and fellowship.

And I, busy type A, and Erin says, double type A” for herself.

Erin: Type Double-A.

Dannah: We need to slow down because our spirits need community.

Laura: I’m thinking of this graphic that I saw when I was doing training at a pregnancy resource clinic. It was of the human development timeline. So, little baby’s development timeline is on the top, and the mother’s developmental time of pregnancy is on the bottom. And there were all these little hash marks in the baby’s life of things developing—this is growing, this is growing, this is happening–all these little dots. And there is nothing on the mother’s timeline. And maybe, like, two inches into this graphic was a little hash mark on the mother’s timeline that says, “Mother suspects pregnancy.”

And when I saw that, I was, like, “Oh my goodness! We all start our lives out with these really significant things happening, and God alone is there with us.” We’re made in His likeness. There He is, intentionally knowing us, connecting with us on purpose. For the rest of eternity, He’ll be doing this. We’re made in His image to be connecting, connecting with Him, knowing He is always there on our timeline, and then with one another.

Dannah: With one another, yes. I sometimes as an introvert believe the lie . . . here we go, here’s a lie I believe. I believe I have to get alone in my closet with Jesus to be a godly woman. Right?

But the Scriptures teach us that we draw close to Him when we draw close to each other, that a significant piece of our ability to connect to Jesus, the Head of the Body, is connecting to the Body. A finger isn’t going to survive unless it’s attached to the body.

And the message that I need, as both an introvert and a type A person, is, “Slow down. Stay connected.”

If you are a righteous woman, and you want to gather righteous women around you, that is not going to happen if you are not readily available to the hearts and minds of women around you. And that means you’ve got to slow down.

Recently, I was sharing in church how I felt a little lonely. And afterwards, two women came up to me—and they did it, they said it very lovingly—but they felt like I wasn’t approachable. I thought, Oh, that’s something I need to work on, because I’m not going to help righteous women gather around me unless I approach them and make myself available to their hearts and to their needs.

Erin: Yes. Several months ago I noticed something that was happening at the beginning of a lot of conversations with a lot of different people in my life. They would say, “I know you’re busy, but . . .” And I was, like, “I’m going to eradicate that from my conversations.” I am busy, but I’m going to figure out ways so that people know I’m available to them, they know that they are important to me. I don’t want any more conversations to start with, “I know you’re busy, but . . .” because people don’t like apologizing for needing something from me. I want to be available.

We had some family friends over in the midst of that. Their little girl, June, she was like three or four at the time. They pulled into our driveway, and June said, “Oooo, I want this pwace!” (She was talking about the Davis Farm.)

I was, like, “That’s actually more the reaction I hope people have when they’re with me, like, “Oooo, I’m so glad to be with her because she values me. She has time for me. Her place, her space, being in her presence makes me feel welcome and wanted.”

But it’s good to pay attention when people are giving you cues that that’s not what they get from you. I was the one that was lonely, and all that when people thought I was too busy for them. I don’t know that they were, but I needed to course correct.

Dannah: Speaking of course correct, let’s course correct this conversation because the purpose of it is not so these people can find Erin or Dannah or Laura. It’s so that they will find Christ in us, because He is the solution to their loneliness. He is the solution to the lies they’re believing. As we have conversations with them, we’ll be able to identify the lies that they’re believing.

We’ve talked about lies. They’re deceptive. They’re sneaky. When we talk to one another, sometimes, Laura, I can see your lie better than you can see it, and you can see my lie better than I can see it. Because you’re a woman of the Word, you can say, “Dannah, I want to open my Bible with you for just a second. Let me show you something about what you just said,” and you can counsel my heart according to the truth of God’s Word.

Laura: I think anytime we discern that things are off, that sometimes loneliness can help us figure that out. “Okay, something’s wrong here because I was made to live in communion with God and others.” Then we have to go back, our original input is God Himself.

There have been times inside my spirit I just feel off. I want to turn to all my coping mechanisms. And the best times have been when I go into my bedroom, close the door, and just lay flat down on my face and say, “Lord, I know it’s You. I know I need You, so please come and fill me.” Those are the best times.

So either through worship music or opening the Word . . . I’m thinking of Psalm 139 where we get a glimpse of Him knowing us from the very beginning, before our days even were numbered, He knew us. He loves us. He’s connecting with us. And it ends with this, this a flat on our face, “Lord, I need you,” prayer. “Search me, O God, and know my heart. [Now that’s the elixir for loneliness.] Try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any grievous way in me. [Anything that hurts, anything that’s not supposed to be in Your eternal plan.] And lead me in the way everlasting.” (ESV)

So I feel if we just daily come to Him, and He fills us with His friendship and fellowship, then we can be in a good spot to gather others and hear from them. We will be the righteous that gather other people around us.

Dannah: If you keep reading in Psalm 139, speaking of loneliness, it says, “Where can I go from Your Spirit?” (Where can I flee from Your presence? That’s how I’ve memorized it.) “If I go up to the heavens, you are there. If I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.”

He’s with you. Wherever you are, whatever lonely pit you’re in. If you don’t have a friend like Laura or Erin, He is your friend, and He is your ultimate solution to that loneliness that you feel.

Erin, Laura, I should thank you for being here today, but what I really want to do is thank you for being there—period. Thank you, Erin.

Erin: Love you.

Dannah: Thanks, Laura.

Laura: Thank you, Dannah.

Dannah: Erin Davis and Laura Booz have been talking practically about the hope we have in the gospel to combat temptations toward loneliness. I hope to hear more from Erin and Laura. Erin has a Bible-teaching podcast called, The Deep Well. And Laura shares stories from real life as a mom and offers a biblical perspective on the podcast Expect Something Beautiful. You can learn more about both of those podcasts at ReviveOurHearts.com.

Nancy and I, along with Bob Lepine, are going to be talking more about how lies bombard us every day, specifically how they’re affecting the younger generation of women. So, whether you are a younger woman, or you want to know how to share the truth with the young women in your life, I think you’ll find the conversation tomorrow very helpful. Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the NIV84 unless otherwise noted.

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