Do you ever feel all alone?  Even though you are often surrounded by people, you feel as if you are the only person in the world facing what you are having to face and going through the trials that you don’t seem to think you can take another moment of…

Loneliness does not care if you are rich or poor.  It does not care if you live in a big house or on the streets.  It does not care if you have a fine job or if you are diving in a dumpster.  Loneliness does not care who you are, what you’ve done or what you hope to do.

Loneliness has come to be your companion, not so that you can have a better and more fulfilling life, but so that it can rob you of what life you have left.  While you may feel like you are all alone, the truth is:  You are never alone, because God has promised that He would never leave you or forsake you.

Just because you can’t see Him, it does not mean that He is not there.  Just because you can’t hear Him, it does not mean that He does not hear you.  Just because you can’t feel Him, it does not mean that He has left you.  Know it or not, believe it or not, He is right here with you in this very moment.

As you read the words on this page, God is with you.  You are not alone!

Whoever you are, wherever you are, whatever you are going through, remember this:  You are not alone, God is with you.  Open your eyes – look for Him and you will be surprised at what He will allow you to see,  Open your ears – listen for Him and you will be amazed at what He will allow you to hear.  Open your heart – yield to Him and you will be blessed with a companionship that will never ever leave you lonely again!

You think you are all alone.  You have come to believe that nobody knows what you are going through and even worse that nobody cares.  But the truth is:  Your Creator knows and cares!

He knows your feelings, because He is the One Who created you with the ability to feel.  He can see the anguish deep in your soul and He cares more than you can realize or understand.  Hurt and pain are often so devestating because they cause us to feel like we are all alone in this world.  It is very possible to be surronded by people and yet feel like we are all by ourselves.

Even though you may feel like it, you are never alone.  God sees, hears and cares for you.  He knows not only your pain, but what it is that has caused your pain.  God made you and He can see and feel things in you, that not even you can see or feel.   He loves you and has an amazing plan to use even the bad for your good, as you love and trust Him.

God knows and that makes all the difference!

In my talking with people almost everyday about their lives and what they want out of their lives, I seem to have discovered a fairly consistent theme.  Most everyone I talk with eventually gets around to saying something like this:  “All I really want in this life is to just be happy!”

I think most everyone wants to be happy, or at least we say we want to be happy.  But not everyone is willing to do what they need to do to be happy.  Many of us have watched someone else live a very unhappy life, when we could plainly see all of the reasons they had to be living a happy life.  We could see it, but they could not.  What’s the old saying?  “Some people can’t see the forest for the trees!”

For the next few days, I am going to be writing about happiness.  We are going to try to discover what it is and some of the steps that we can take to get our lives to a place where we can experience it.

President Abraham Lincoln said:  “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be!”  I think he was onto something.  One of the problems that a lot of us have with not experiencing happiness, is our definitions.  We have all kinds of different definitions of happiness and the problem is not so much our different definitions, but the challenge they present us, when we are trying to figure out what it is that will really make us happy.

For most happiness is based on what we don’t have that we are trying to get, but the truth that we all know deep in our heart – is that happiness is about much more than that.  We are always striving, but only every now and then obtaining and the big things that gets in the way of our happiness is often our own opinion or the opinion of others.

Our thoughts betray us and so what we really need is wisdom.  Wisdom to choose the right thoughts that will lead and open our life to happiness.  In James 1:5-6 is says:  “5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. 6 But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.”

God will provide, but you have to receive!  More on how to do that tomorrow!  Blessings!