Title: Overcome Loneliness / 2 Timothy 4:9-17
Overcome loneliness / 2 Timothy 4:9-17
“The Lord stood by me and gave me strength so that the word proclaimed through me might be fully preached and that all Gentiles might hear it, and I was delivered from the mouth of the lion” (2 Timothy 4:9-17).
First, what makes me lonely? It is when people who have been by my side leave me. Verse 10 is the names of those who were with Paul and left him for various reasons. Loneliness comes when someone leaves me. When you lose your spouse, when a close friend moves away, or when your children move away from home.
The most difficult of all is when the person you loved and trusted leaves you. Paul missed people. So he said to Timothy, “Come quickly to me” (verse 9).
Second, how do we overcome this loneliness? In verse 13, Paul told Timothy, “Bring books specially written on leather paper.” Paul did not want to be sympathetic to others by complaining about his circumstances in prison. Next, Paul overcame loneliness by believing that the Lord was with him. Many people around me have left, but I confess, "The Lord stands by me and gives me strength." Paul also overcame loneliness by responding to the needs of others. “That the word that was preached through me might be fully preached, so that all Gentiles might hear it,” he says. The loneliest people in the world are the ones who focus only on their work. The more difficult and lonely you are, the more difficult and harder it is for you to go to your neighbors.