Find Your People: Building Deep Community in a Lonely World

by Jennie Allen

my neuro-buddy Curt Thompson likes to say we all come into the world looking for someone looking for us.

One by one I went to my people and did exactly what I used to be terrified to do: I openly acknowledged that I needed them.

I want us to trade lonely and isolated lives that experience brief bursts of connectedness for intimately connected lives that know only brief intervals of feeling alone.

As I mentioned, research says that more than three in five Americans report being chronically lonely, and that number is “on the rise.”

Scientists now warn that loneliness is worse for our health than obesity, smoking, lack of access to health care, and physical inactivity.

I begin this journey with you aware of two things: People make up the best parts of life. People make up the most painful parts of life.

what pushes people deeper into our inner circles of friends? The amount of time we spend with them. Time.

God built us for deep connection to be part of our day-in, day-out lives, not just once in a while in the presence of a paid therapist.

Outside of Jesus, relationships are the greatest gifts we have on earth and simultaneously the most difficult part of being alive.

Author and pastor Tim Keller said, The life of the Trinity is characterized not by self-centeredness but by mutually self-giving love. When we delight and serve someone else, we enter into a dynamic orbit around him or her, we center on the interests and desires of the other. That creates a dance, particularly if there are three persons, each of whom moves around the other two.[3]

We weren’t just built for community; we were built because of it.

If God is in the center of our relational circle, we will be fulfilled, and out of that fulfillment we can bless others. But if people are in the center of our relational circle, we end up pulling on others to meet needs that they can’t ever fully meet.

We are called to be a community of people, on a mission, delighting in God, delighting in each other, redeemed and reconciling the world, bringing them and inviting them into this family. This is the ultimate purpose of community.

ultimately community is meant to open the doors wide to every person on earth and invite them into a family that exists forever with God.

Jesus’s world, for example, it was actually illegal for a family to live somewhere without a school close by, and so for every twenty-five boys, a teacher would be appointed.

Loneliness first began to show up in a significant way at the rise of the Industrial Revolution.[13] When factories automated everything, people’s lives became easier and more self-reliant. But efficiency came at a great cost; namely, we didn’t need each other all the time.

In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets. Now that Charles is dead, I shall never again see Ronald’s reaction to a specifically [Charles] joke. Far from having more of Ronald, having him “to myself” now that Charles is away, I have less of Ronald.[1]

Professor and author Brené Brown famously told the story of a group of women in a remote village in Africa who spent their late afternoons at the river’s edge, washing their families’ clothes by hand.[2] There in the sunlight, they would swap stories. They would ask questions. They would check in with each other. Most days, they would laugh so hard that they’d cry. These women were stuck in the throes of poverty, but you wouldn’t know it, aside from the tattered clothing and the obvious detail that they were forced to wash clothes in mucky waters. Well, sometime later, the entire village experienced a massive shift in its resourcefulness, after residents learned to plant and harvest crops. They could sell fruits and vegetables in a larger town nearby. With their new income, they could afford uniforms and send their kids to school. They could upgrade their modest huts to substantial, permanent structures. They could wire their lives with electricity. They could dig wells and finally have clean water. They could even buy a few modern conveniences, like cell phones, toaster ovens—and washing machines. Interestingly, once nearly every home in the village had its own washing machine, the prevalence of depression among the moms in that region rose sharply. What was going on here? The village was thriving, right? Look at all the stuff they had! The explanation may not be obvious to you and me, but it is to people like Pastor Mugisha, who was raised in a family of refugees followi...

“The more resources a person gets, the more walls he or she puts up. And the more lonely they become.”

Proximity. They enjoyed physical closeness to each other and God. Transparency. They were naked and unashamed, fully known and fully loved. Accountability. They lived under submission to God and to each other. Shared Purpose. They were given a clear calling to care for creation. Consistency. They couldn’t quit each other. They needed each other and shared everything together.

Nothing in my relational life has helped me more than coming to terms with these simple truths: You will disappoint me. I will disappoint you. God will never disappoint us.

Run—don’t walk—away from toxic people who will lead you into sin and away from God. Instead, choose friends who will fight for you, friends who will fight alongside you, and friends who are as committed as you are to fighting against the dark.

we all need a network of regular people who are present in our daily lives.

You will never have friends unless you are willing to consistently initiate.

THE SAGE This is the friend who listens, prays, and advises. They love for you to bring them a problem. They carry godly wisdom earned through study and/or life experience. They are safe and trustworthy. The apostle Paul was a sage friend to Timothy.

THE ENCOURAGER This is the cheerleader, the friend who believes in you. They see the good in you and call it out. It is easy for them to speak hope when you are discouraged. They see the best in life and people. This person oozes belief and support.

THE FOXHOLE FRIEND This is just a good companion. This friend gets their hands dirty with you. If you have an idea, they are all in! They will fight for you and fight beside you. I have a friend, Jenn Jett Barrett, who calls herself a dream defender and has helped along almost every dream I have ever built. Your foxhole friend may not use words to express what you mean to her, but she’ll be right beside you and share in whatever trouble you get into.

THE CHALLENGER This is the friend who isn’t afraid to tell you the truth. They won’t let you

THE FUN ONE This is the friend that brings the party. They might not have a two-hour debate with you about a theological issue, but they will make sure you laugh often. They are spontaneous and pull people together and say something inappropriate that interrupts whatever bad mood you find yourself stuck in.

THE PLANNER This is the organized and thoughtful friend

No one can be your everything, but everyone has something to say, something to teach you, and something to bring to your life. Look for it.

Researchers say that to grow an acquaintance to a good friend takes clocking two hundred hours together.[6]

We must risk pain to have this kind of deep connection in our lives.

Research tells us that we begin feeling shame between fifteen and eighteen months of age.

You will only be as close to a friend as you are vulnerable with her.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable,” C. S. Lewis famously wrote. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable…. To love…is to be vulnerable.[5]

Ideas for Building Relationships with Transparency · · · · · · Instead of ordering something on Amazon, try to borrow it from your neighbor instead. Move your firepit or picnic table into the front yard. Talk to people as they walk by and invite them to join you! Invite your neighbors to watch a movie on a projector in your front yard. Ask your safe people to meet up for coffee and prepare them that you want to go deeper. Answer honestly the next time someone asks, “How are you doing?” Call a friend instead of texting her. Even if it’s not a serious call, it gets you talking a little bit more. Ask your friends about the highs and lows of their week. Tell someone you like her. Literally say, “I like spending time with you.” Work without your headphones. Make yourself available. Leave your phone in the car when you meet up with a friend. Ask someone for her advice with something you’re struggling with, even if it’s small.

C. S. Lewis said, “Friendship must be about something, even if it were only an enthusiasm for dominoes or white mice. Those who have nothing can share nothing; those who are going nowhere can have no fellow-travellers.”

C. S. Lewis said it this way: “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.”[6]

A friend who is a pastor in the underground church told me, “We have a saying in the Middle East that you don’t know someone until you’ve gone on a trip with them and you’ve eaten with them. It’s so true. The camaraderie. You don’t see that in the West. When, for example, COVID-19 hit the Middle East, me and the leaders all hunkered down in one house. The twenty of us with kids. You really bond when that happens.” He continued, “True discipleship doesn’t happen out there; it happens in a home. True discipleship isn’t something you do once a week. It’s what you do every day because that’s when you get to know people.

I asked my pastor friend why the Church in the West has lost the sense of camaraderie and connectedness that characterizes his community in the Middle East. He said, “Because the West is all about individualism, convenience, and being comfortable. Discipleship is inconvenient, uncomfortable, and very messy.”

Conflict should make friendships, not break them.

Conflict is safe when you know you won’t quit each other.