Jesus Never Said…You Have to Do Life Alone

Hey friend, it's Laura, and welcome to another episode of the Girl Talk podcast. Today, the girls are talking about something that Jesus never said, that you have to do life alone. After this conversation, I'll be back for the Girl Talk group chat, so stick around for that. This is the Girl Talk podcast, things Jesus never said. Hello there, you're listening to the Girl Talk podcast. My name is Carol. I'm Kelly. I'm Tricia. And we're glad you've joined us today. You are not meant to do life alone. Can I get an amen? Amen. Amen. I was just immediately picturing like Alone and Afraid or all those like television shows where you're like- That's Naked and Afraid. Naked and Afraid. And there's an Alone. Different. Alone. But like, that sounds scary. Yeah. Doing life totally alone sounds really scary. You open yourself up to all kinds of dangers. Yes. Absolutely you do. Absolutely you do. So I want to share a quote that I read. I found this week and it speaks both to community and what we need to look for in community. God did not design friendship to be convenient. He designed it to be formative. That's good. To sharpen, to stretch, to expose. And when our faith is never challenged by our circle, we have curated it for image, not for growth. That's pretty powerful right there. Okay, read that. Last sentence again. When our faith is never challenged by our circle, we have curated it for image, not for growth. I have never thought about friendship exactly like that. As formative. Yeah. And as not for convenience or comfort or fun. I've always thought about it like that. That's interesting. I mean, it totally can be as well. But I think if you're, well, let's take a step back. Let's talk about loneliness. We have a loneliness. We have a loneliness epidemic in our country right now. And it's because of these things that we carry around in our pockets all the time. Our phones. Because it makes us feel connected, but it really isn't connection at all. Yeah. Yeah. And your loneliness epidemic isn't just your feeling. It is actually scientifically proven that we have a loneliness epidemic. The Department of Health and Human Services did a study back in 2023 that said that loneliness, not happiness. But it's not just about loneliness. It's about the fact that we have a loneliness epidemic. And it's not just about loneliness. um i feel it in the moment but like the intentionality of going back going to someone and going i need somebody to hold me accountable for this is something i desire i like i really want i want that but that is not the way i have set up my relationships i feel like i've set my relationships up that i can be more of a place where people can come and confess to me i was gonna say that very thing leadership is one of your giftings and i think people seek you out for that but i think it's also important for you to have that and i think that's what's dangerous especially in the christian community is because if you're if you have a strong personality and you're you have leadership qualities you can often get yourself in that situation and that is a very lonely place that's a good point yep yeah that's another thing that we don't talk about near enough i think in christian circles about leadership is that it can be a very lonely place and leadership being the boss right it's all right right being yeah being the women's ministry leader that's right or the bible study leader or the life group leader that's right right whatever it is i mean it can be any area of leadership you can work in the nursery and still be lonely because um you've just been given those gifts and people seek you out for those things but you don't often and and part of it is they see a maturity in you um and see you walking with jesus and and they want that and so i think that's both a blessing and can be a curse if you let it go too far but i wouldn't say maybe you're not intentionally seeking out those things but i know in conversations that you and i have you'll often say i know i shouldn't right or i feel it and i'll do the same but it's not a formal oh we're going to sit down right week after week yes and and confess to each other it happens naturally in relationship right yeah and i think that's the you know that that's so important and that's there i do a lot of that you know somebody will say aha this drove me crazy and i needed to confess this or then i will go yeah me too like i me too i struggle with that exact same thing me too um so i am quick i am quick to do that and i think that's an important piece of confession as well sure also not trying to make ourselves all look all rosy and put put together and right like oh i never make mistakes yeah um i'll go back to something you said you said you know we're not finger pointing each other and that's not confession confession is not finger pointing confession is when i come to you and say i've really been convicted about this and i need to confess to somebody and be held accountable um and they pray for you and they pray for you and and i will say this if you're in a relationship where someone is always using the bible as a sword and not a mirror that's a dangerous relationship because you're never going to feel like you're on the same road you're not going to feel like you're on the same road you're not going to feel like you're on the same level right um always before i give someone a correction i ask god use your word as my mirror before i ever go to this person with your sword and try to correct them and remove the log from my own eye before i try to and then i'm so nervous about a good grief because you won't find a more messed up person than this girl right here but there are there are times when god calls us to do that and it's not easy but he will will see you through that and i love that you brought up that it's not finger pointing either way because i don't think that's formative i don't know if anybody's ever grown because somebody's wagged a finger at him but and that becomes what we think god is doing oh yeah right he's not he's doing this come to me not whack you over the head yeah yeah i just love this idea of having formative relationships because i like you said i think we we're doing that anyway um and i want i want to look more like jesus you know i want to i want i want to look more like jesus and i want to feel like i look more like jesus you know as opposed to feeling like i am um never measuring up or feeling like i never have it together or feeling like i always are saying the wrong thing you know when i say the wrong thing i feel guilty about it yeah and um you know that's the thing that i'm trying to do is i'm trying to feel like i'm the lord's conviction to say hey let's not uh do that kind of have that kind of behavior in the future um but i want to stop feeling that way you know i want to be like more like jesus um yeah so having those jesus friends is so important yeah so do you have community now that you're completely open with i do yeah i do too yeah yeah but that that doesn't come without some effort sure oh absolutely yeah absolutely right and i think that comes with shared experiences you know it doesn't um you it doesn't happen overnight you don't just walk into a group of people and go hey that one i think i'm going to be friends with her and she's going to be my bestie and uh all of a sudden you're besties um it takes time and it takes experiences and it takes uh lots and lots of conversations over and over and over again to be able to really feel like i'm a part of that form those kinds of relationships that are that are safe yeah so when has friendship been a blessing to you and what would you tell somebody who is isolated right now is the benefit to community i learned that um having built a community a safe community during times in my life that have gone well it was really helpful when things didn't go well that's right that's right yeah you know you build the relationships you build a community and it's not so that when you go through a hard time someone's there but it's a wonderful benefit of that yeah yeah when my mom died and everything fell apart for us and then my dad we just had so many awful things happening the people that i had been in community and bible study with for several years they just came all around us yeah doing things from praying all the way to practical things like yarmulke yard work because we just couldn't do it right and i don't think um that that relationship was built before the trauma happened right yeah but you get to a deeper level when people care for you that way yes yes you never forget it i'll never forget it i'll never forget what it felt like to see those bags of of leaves and and stuff that they picked up off our yard felt to see and just so great yeah i know for me it's um having having friendships where i can process hard things um is so important to me and so um being able to really ask other somebody else for advice and knowing that they know me well enough to give good godly counsel yeah um that's gonna match with my own journey my own um story and struggles it makes that advice so much richer and so much more likely for me to to go in that direction because they uh they know me so well because i've been so open and honest with them about other things so that's how for me friendships good godly friendships have really benefited me is in processing uh the hard things of life because we're going to go through hard things we're going to go through lots of hard things and having that safe place to to talk about it is important i find that a lot of women find it difficult to make friends as an adult why do you think that is we don't have a lot of free time a lot of times it's true not everybody is a mom but some are and um oftentimes we work some do some don't but we don't there's there's not a lot of time to cultivate friendships and so you've got to be intentional about figuring out how to do that oftentimes it's through church that's been the case for me yeah our church our connect groups our small groups our bible studies they've all been birthed out of uh church because it's it's hard to find time to connect yeah yeah and i will say that uh some of my best friends have come from things that my daughter was involved with because we showed up at the same place you know at the dance studio or different places there's time there because all you got is time uh you're waiting in it dance competitions you're waiting right and so some of those places have been you know where our kids have come from and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we have a lot of people that are willing to invest in our children and i think that's one of the things that i think is important is that we one of the reasons why we have a hard time making relationships is because sometimes we start them off um from a place of sin so here let me unpack that a little bit it's so easy for us to um start up a conversation with somebody by talking about a third person to go look at somebody and go did you see that person do that thing and all of a sudden we've the formation of our relationship off um from a place of sin so here let me unpack that a little bit it's so easy for us to start them and all of a sudden the god we as women are really bad at gossip really bad to have gossip inside our really bad to have gossip inside our really bad to have gossip inside our relationships and so when we have gossip relationships and so when we have gossip relationships and so when we have gossip inside of our relationships we look at at um the relationship and go well if you're going to talk about her yeah behind her back you're talking about me behind my back at some point in time yeah and so we don't develop those deep friendships because we started them off and continue them from a place of sin yeah and i'm talking to myself as much as i'm talking to anybody else because i'm just as guilty as anybody else um but that's i know some of the relationships i've had in the past that did never go anywhere i was like oh that's because we started it out yeah talking about a third person so we gotta we gotta keep our motivation we gotta we gotta be believers yeah we gotta act like we love jesus and um like jesus is working through us to love other people as opposed to tearing down people behind their backs yeah i will also say serving with people takes your relationship to a different place okay than just sitting down and having coffee or whatever that's a great place to start but when you serve with somebody too you really get to know uh the ins and outs of their personalities and you build a deeper level of community there so what if someone is listening right now and they're like community feels risky for me what would you say to them yes it is risky yeah it it doesn't just feel risky all right it is definitely risky right it is but it's worth it it's worth it it is yeah i got hurt by a group of people that i really really trusted uh in in a church setting yeah too and um i had to really work to forgive them and to return to church and return to community with them but god helped me to do that um and but i had to i had to do some forgiveness work um and it is so it's risky it is risky but i will say now having come on the other side of it it's worth it yeah because i'm back in relationship maybe a different trust level we've talked about that before but i am back in relationship in a healthy place and um what came through it what was the thing that kind of pushed you over the edge to say i'm going to try again um i realized that i wasn't helping myself to turn my back on it um i tried i was like well i'm not going back to this group and i am just not going to do it and i'm like they didn't even notice wait a minute but i gotta teach you how to get angry yeah i gotta do it more publicly that's right but but i i i realized i was hurting myself yeah i wasn't hurting them right and it wasn't helping it wasn't helping me it wasn't helping them i actually brought it to them i brought it to their attention i said here's why i was hurt and it wasn't helping me it wasn't helping them that gave them the ability to do what i needed them to do to understand they they did apologize they didn't have to apologize um and i i could have moved on i think even if they hadn't apologized because i've jesus did a work in my heart yeah yeah but i gave them the ability to you know you know here's the thing and this is i don't want to get on a rabbit trail on this but that we don't do that well in church we just leave and we take our ball and we go somewhere else yeah with the same baggage that we left and we don't do that well in church we just leave and we left with and then we start another relationship with that same baggage and and it just there's a cumulative effect i think if we were better about saying you know i i know you probably didn't mean to but this is this was really hurtful for me and giving people the opportunity because they learned something from that too yeah um whether or not they they made a change they learned from that too and we're all imperfect people trying to do this life um like jesus and we're going to get it wrong we're going to get it wrong a lot but i i applaud you for going to them and saying here are the things that are hurt me and giving them the opportunity because i think we don't do that i waited until i was in a better place yeah yeah oh sure sure yeah the immediate yeah was not a good experience would not have gone as well yeah yeah yeah what about you not even remember what the original question was so you're gonna have to read is it risky yes community feels risky yeah totally is risky and um yeah i've got some of those same hurts and yeah um we can easily become a counseling session here you want me to move you can lie down but i think for me some of it too is give your new community the benefit of the doubt um that it is it is going to be risky yeah and at the same time the other people are coming to it a new relationship and it's risky for them too that's right but if you give each other the benefit of the doubt as you start out a new relationship um it can just it can turn out to be beautiful beautiful relationships yeah but you do have to give each other the benefit of the doubt and it's like any other relationship you're gonna have to work through challenges you're gonna have to work through things yeah and that's what makes relationships stronger right so community you need it it will bless you don't isolate yourself you don't have to live this life alone jesus never asked you to do that and we love you if there's a way we can pray for you if there's a way that you want to reach out and let us know your situation and a way that we can pray for you please don't hesitate to email us at girl talk at the light fm.org you can also get in touch on the facebook pages know that we love you and we long for you to live in community because you have something that the body of christ needs and you are going to be blessed by community so find your people and we'll see you next time we gather around these microphones for the next girl talk podcast time for the group chat all right so um i was actually just thinking of this and i want to hear what your thoughts are what if god picked his friendships like we pick ours like how selective we are of okay like this it wouldn't look good for me to do this hang out with this person because xyz and truly maybe it wouldn't but um how would it look or how inconvenient is this going to be for me or this person is just so annoying and we'll never stop talking or xyz if jesus personal i was actually thinking of myself maybe i should shut up more but what if what if the lord did that to us there would be only enemies of god yeah if if he picked the way that we do that's so true that's good i love the way he picked friends like just go back through the gospels and see who his closest companions were and um they were fun but they were broken people and smelled bad they smelled like fish yeah right or were tax collectors like the hated of the hated or had seven demons in them you know those are not the people you necessarily want to start off having a friendship with but wow what an example jesus was for us in um reaching out to people and i think he saw potential oh yeah you know what i mean so oh yeah someone we see where they are now but jesus sees the potential yeah yeah that's good and he had them walking with him every day like he chose to walk with these people every single day and i think we choose to walk with these people every day to do that once a month for dinner during bible study or life group and like it's a slow it's a slow process so at the rate of once a month how much slower is that process going to be well and i think that's part of why it's really important um where you choose to work because we are going to surround ourselves with people at work for many many many more hours than we will surround ourselves with people at church or even people on the ball field yeah or people in our neighborhood even our family um and so quit our jobs right not that i'm recommending anybody quit their job don't say you heard that on the girl talk podcast but um it is very important when you are looking for a place of employment that you are analyzing if these are the people that you want to do life with that's good yeah um another question how do you know when god is asking you to step up and lead with someone versus when you're just simply taking a step back and say i'm going to take a step back and say i'm going to take a step on too much because you feel responsible for the people around you we'll start with harold so i i've come through a time where i had to actually take a step back and ask for help which was the hardest thing for me to do because i've confessed here before i know i can't do it all but i want to do it all and uh so i've just come through a season where i've had to you know actually raise my hand and say i need some help with this um and i i noticed that i was um starting to um resent not resent maybe maybe resent's not the right word but i was trying i was starting to dread the the thing that god had given me right and i was starting to dread it and i didn't want to dread it i wanted to serve well and do what he called me to do but um there are there are limits and just because uh you have leadership qualities doesn't mean you have to say yes to everything and so that's been a big lesson to me in my limits and also in asking for help um i i knew god called me to do this but he doesn't always call you to do it forever and uh there are seasons when he when he calls you to do it with help and that's all been a learning process for me that i did not um did not necessarily ask for or seek him and yeah well and i think one of the things to remember too is um especially in the relationship piece of what you're talking about um is that it we are to do the one another's that when we come to relationship with other people um we come not as mentor and mentee you know not as leader and follower necessarily those there's relationships that are intentional in that way but when we're talking about just general community with people um approaching those relationships from a togetherness and a a one anotherness and a um everything is level at the foot of the cross kind of way i think is such a healthy way to start off of a relationship with someone and i'll say uh especially in leadership the results aren't up to you that was an important thing for me to learn um that god is in the business of changing people not me and so if i don't think that someone is going to be able to change me i'm not going to think that someone is going to be able to change me i'm not going to think that someone is going at the rate that they should or it's not up to me that's god's business yeah yeah when it comes to the question of the question was like are you supposed to like help a friend or lead lead somebody yeah how do you know when god's asking you to step up and lead versus when you're just taking on too much because you feel responsible i think again i was kind of sound like a broken record but probably because this is like my major focus right now like what is the motive what would be the reason that i would would try to lead this person is it because um i want to look like i'm doing the right thing is it because i i feel like i i should to make other people happy with me or is it that i feel led by the lord to come into relationship with this person and and link arms with them in in a more intimate way um i want to be always ready to be interrupted by god um and um for him to speak to me yes i want you to interact with this person okay i know you're tired i know you got a lot on your plate but i want you to do that um so really trying to be honest about am i feeling this from the lord or am i feeling this as like an external pressure yeah that's good yeah that's good um tina was talking about the importance of confession and she uh reminded us of first john five first john one five through ten that talks about fellowship with god and how it relates to fellowship with each other and confession of sins and um she said we have to keep in our minds that owning our sin with people we trust is hard but if we remind each other that those sins have been paid for that helps us feel clean and holy instead of judged by our fellow brothers and sisters um and it can help us be more willing to be open with one another the next time so that's just a good reminder of hey like god does not condemn but he does convict yeah and when we confess that then it can only go up from here that's right right yep yep and god uses other people in that way you know when we confess there's lots of different ways god communicates to us he uses his word uses his holy spirit but he also uses other people and you know lets them encourage us to be more like him and i will say let's follow his example it was his kindness that led us to repentance and so let our kindness be what leads others to repentance not our pointing the fingers that's healing both of those things happen in community yes yep that's so true yeah all right that's it for the girl talk group chat we're gonna do it here in a couple of weeks and thank you so much for joining us we so appreciate you spending time with us today and we'll see you next 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