FamilyLife Today®

Speaker 1

We live our lives socially on gas station snack food. Really, we just have these little tiny interactions with people.

We're scrolling on our phone, and we think that if we text someone and we send them a goofy meme or a gif or something like that, that we're actually connecting with people.

But you're just shoving the equivalent of Doritos and nerds gummy clusters into your mouth all the time. You're not actually getting nutrition the way that you need.

Speaker 2

Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson.

Speaker 3

And I'm Dave Wilson. And you can find us atfamilylife today.com. this is family Life Today.

Speaker 4

The audience needs a songwriting contest right now. This is happening between Shelby and Dave. You'll notice at the center of the table.

Speaker 1

Is this a surprise?

Speaker 4

Yeah. At the center of the table. We call this song and a Hat. Even though there's no hat, you're gonna pick.

Speaker 3

Wait a minute. They call it some. We've never done it before, so there isn't, like, I've done this before.

Speaker 1

Yeah. Who's they? You. There is.

Speaker 4

There are two things you'll be pulling from. One of them is the topic of the song that's in the black bowl.

The second thing is in that cream-colored jar. "Wow" is a word that you have to incorporate into the song.

You'll draw one piece of paper from each, and you both will write a song. Then, we'll have you perform it.

Speaker 3

One of the reasons they came up with this idea is we watch you on Facebook and Instagram and you got your little guitar up there, and you're doing some time.

Speaker 2

You've got some parodies that you can do.

Speaker 3

And I do parodies too. So they came up with this idea. You know, Shelby Abbott, the former voice of Family Life Today.

Speaker 2

I think you're gonna be really good at this.

Speaker 3

All right, Shelby, go ahead.

Speaker 1

Great. Now, no pressure than.

Speaker 3

And pick one.

Speaker 1

And one.

Speaker 3

You gotta tell us.

Speaker 1

Reveal what this is.

Speaker 3

Yeah, you gotta tell us what it is. Song about what?

Speaker 1

Arguing with your spouse.

Speaker 3

Ooh, ooh.

Speaker 1

And here's the word. I have to include. Gumption.

Speaker 3

Gumption. All right, mine is family dinner time.

Speaker 2

What's your word?

Speaker 1

What?

Speaker 3

I can't use that word.

Speaker 1

Wait, is it inappropriate?

Speaker 3

I don't know what it is.

Speaker 4

Well, I'll pick a different one.

Speaker 1

Let me see.

Speaker 3

Flummoxed.

Speaker 1

Flummoxed. Flummoxed. You get, like, flummoxed. You're, like, bothered. You're, like, frustrated. Yeah.

Speaker 3

How do you say it?

Speaker 1

Flummoxed.

Speaker 3

Flummoxed.

Speaker 1

Yeah.

Speaker 3

I've never heard that word in my life.

Speaker 1

You need to read more.

Speaker 3

Flummox. Flummox.

Speaker 1

Gumption.

Speaker 3

Family dinner time. Sitting down for dinner with the kids and the dog, food will be flying, and I'll be flux mugged. Whatever the word is, I'll be flummoxed.

The kids will be on their phones, and mom will be so mad. I'm gonna jump up and leave. Cause I'm the one in charge.

Cause dinner time is a great time for fun. Family fun. There's my song. Ooh, he's going to Kia V. I like it.

Speaker 1

So arguing with your spouse and gumption. She's got gumption. I can't function. We eat luncheon. Her faults I mention. Tell me it's my fault. I'll tell her I love her because I just, just, just fired my inner lawyer. That's all I got.

Speaker 3

All right, all right, all right, all right.

Speaker 1

I tried to do a positive that.

Speaker 2

Even had, like, a little bit of meaning behind it. Shelby, are we done?

Speaker 1

Oh, we're done.

Speaker 4

That was more than I could have ever imagined. You guys nailed it.

Speaker 3

Well, Shelby's not here to talk about songwriting.

Speaker 1

No. Because I'm horrible at it.

Speaker 3

You should go follow him on his Instagram. What's it called?

Speaker 1

Shelby Abbott.

Speaker 3

Shelby Abbott. And there's every once in a while a little parody on there.

Speaker 1

Yeah, every now and then. It depends on if I get the opportunity with students, but.

Speaker 3

Welcome back to family life today.

Speaker 1

Thank you. It's good to be here. I know. Maybe you saw the schedule with me coming today, and you were like, well, well, well.

Speaker 2

We were so happy.

Speaker 3

No, we were excited. We're like, shall we coming in the studio?

Speaker 2

Because we also know this book is amazing.

Speaker 1

Oh, thank you.

Speaker 2

And it's part of your heart and part of your journey.

Speaker 1

It is. It's called "Why We're Feeling Lonely and What We Can Do About It." I really believe that loneliness is one of the major roadblocks for so many young people who are struggling to walk with God and just be connected to a community.

Almost universally, in my conversations with young people over the last several years, the common denominator has been a struggle with loneliness in some form or fashion.

And so I wanted to explore why that's happening.

Speaker 3

Was that true 20 years ago, 30 years ago?

Speaker 1

I mean, it's always been around, for sure. I would guess that it's not as big of a deal back then as it has been now.

I read a couple of things. And I will read the statistic to you. The Surgeon General of the United States sees loneliness as a public health concern, equating its mortality impact to smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

Speaker 2

I remember reading it thinking, how can that be true?

Speaker 1

Yeah, that's crazy. It's really crazy because loneliness isn't just a thing that you feel. I mean, how many cigarettes affects you physically?

Speaker 3

How many cigarettes are in a pack?

Speaker 1

I don't know.

Speaker 2

You would know more than anybody.

Speaker 1

My father smoked, but my mom did, too.

Speaker 3

And I'm thinking, that's a pack or more a day.

Speaker 1

Yeah. Around that.

Speaker 3

Right.

Speaker 1

It was declared like a loneliness epidemic in the United States. And there are key factors that kind of pour into that.

Now, to answer your question about, like, was this happening in the past? Of course it was happening in the past, but it's more of an issue now because of the technology that we have in our lives and how we folded it into who we are as people that we think will make us more connected with others, when in reality, all it does is drive us apart.

There's nothing social really about social media anymore. It was created to connect people, but now all it does is entertain people. It's just another form of entertainment. And when you're sitting behind your phone waiting to be entertained, you're not actually connecting with anybody.

Speaker 3

Does the next generation know that? Because I remember. We're old enough to remember when there was no technology, there was no cell phone. I remember thinking when the first cell phone idea. We were in seminary, early 80s.

Speaker 1

Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2

They were using.

Speaker 3

And I said to Alan, we should invest. We should invest in this.

Speaker 2

They called it a bag phone for that.

Speaker 3

It was a big old thing. You could take it in your car.

Speaker 1

Like, what?

Speaker 3

And then when we first got, like, a real cell phone, my thought was, and I think this was the M.O. of the day, was, this will eliminate bringing work home.

I'll be able to get it done. I'll be connected.

And I thought it would free up our life. And it did the opposite.

Speaker 1

The exact opposite.

Speaker 3

You can't get away from work. It's the same thing in relationships, right?

Speaker 1

Yep, absolutely.

Speaker 3

So we're connected, but we're not.

Speaker 1

Yeah. I mean, I would want to say that the heart of the desire to create social media was. I mean, put it in the name. Is to be social with other people.

And, like, oh, you connect with your friends. That's what Facebook was. When it first came out, it was only on college campuses. You had to have a .edu email address in order to sign up for Facebook when it first came out.

Speaker 2

And MySpace wasn't the first one.

Speaker 1

Yeah, and MySpace was another one. You could share music preferences, and you had the top, I don't know, eight people who were your best friends at the top. You could move them. It was almost like a speed dial. Who was on your speed dial back then? And so it was opportunities to connect with people.

But over time, as corporations got involved, advertising became part of it. We were vying for people's attention as opposed to their desire to connect with other people. And so attention became the commodity that people wanted to utilize.

If we can keep their attention, let's do whatever we can to sell them whatever we want to. And it became like gambling, as opposed to connection with other people in your life.

Speaker 3

I mean, I've never heard that term with social media, like gambling. It really is because you're rolling the dice to see what algorithm's gonna hit. And then I can be more connected and actually make money.

Speaker 1

Well, they've hired people who invented and work on slot machines in Vegas at social media companies to help them actually understand how to keep people hooked, like, how to keep them connected.

Because slot machines especially, I haven't played, but, like, the digital ones now, I've seen movies. They pull the thing or they push the button or whatever, and it's like a chance about what's going to happen.

And it's that addiction there that pours into the desire to see more, to absorb more, to connect more. And so that is what people have utilized now to keep people's attention.

And so it does the exact opposite of what it was invented for.

Speaker 2

I think a lot of our listeners know, you know, your voice, have an idea of what you've done in the. But these younger generations really are important to you. Share a little bit why that is and even your background.

Speaker 1

I became a Christian through the ministry of Crew my freshman year at Virginia Tech. It changed my life, and I got involved immediately and eventually became a leader within Crew. When I got to them about midway through my junior year of college, I realized that I had to come on staff. This is what I felt like I was built for. So, I joined the staff as soon as I graduated, raised my support for about eight months, and my first ministry assignment was at James Madison University in Virginia. I was there for seven years doing what we would call kind of like normal campus ministry—leading a Bible study, discipling men, running our large group meetings, and being in charge of retreats and conferences. I just loved it. I absolutely loved it.

I felt like the old adage that Bill Bright came up with in the 50s was true: "Reach the campus today, you reach the world tomorrow." I bought into that completely because the leaders of tomorrow were on the college campus today. It's a little bit different culturally, but generally, you're working with sharp people when they come to a college campus—people who want to get a career and are driven in a certain way. If you can reach them at this key point in their lives, where they're not under the supervision of mom and dad anymore, and if they show up to a Bible study, they actually want to be there, it creates a different dynamic.

You can be more serious about things; it doesn't always have to be about entertaining them with a game first. No, let's actually hop into the Bible study. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with games; I love doing that. But there's a seriousness that people have. They don't want to be impressed; they want authenticity. I might step on somebody's toes here, but they don't want the fog machines, the light shows, or the perfectly curated worship set. They enjoy those kinds of things, but they'd rather have genuine connection. They would rather have authenticity.

They want someone upfront who talks about their flaws and what they've learned as a result. They still want mentors and sages who have gone before them, and they don't really care what you look like. They would rather have someone talk about the reality of what they've gone through. I'm all about that. I'm all about being genuine and real. I will talk about my flaws and what I've gone through, including what I'm currently struggling with. I am a failure just as much as they are. If we point to Jesus as the source of genuine help in their lives, they're going to respond to that.

Speaker 3

What if the questions you're too embarrassed to ask are the ones your marriage needs answered?

Speaker 2

Marriage After Dark is Family Life's newest podcast where a real married couple talks openly about healthy God honoring sex. Yes, the stuff you'd never ask your pastor or your friends.

Speaker 3

Yeah. So for more go to familylife.com marriage after dark because intimacy shouldn't stay in the dark. Again, that's familylife.com marriage after dark.

Speaker 2

You've worked decades with these younger generations. So I'm guessing, like, this topic is something that you've seen.

Have you experienced this idea of loneliness?

And what are you seeing as you talk to these kids? Are you seeing it as you talk to them?

Speaker 3

What she really wants to know is your story.

Speaker 1

Yeah, well, I've definitely experienced loneliness in a sense that about five years ago, I was struggling a lot with physical pain. I have a herniated disc in my lower back that puts pressure on my sciatic nerve. I did everything to try to get rid of it, and it's still present in my life. It is, yeah. It's not as bad as it was before, by the grace of God. But feeling pain—and Dave, you know this—physical pain can make you look around and go, nobody understands this. Nobody gets me. Now, even my wife, who would try to be empathetic sometimes with certain things, I'd be like, she does not understand. And just that sentence that you say to yourself puts distance between you and other people. It makes you feel like, I'm all alone. Alone. I'm alone. Nobody gets this.

So that, coupled with really just trying to connect with Jesus in those moments, can be really difficult until someone kind of helps you to understand that Jesus really does get what you're going through. By its very nature, you need people to tell you that; you need friends to be in your life. At this season in my life, when I was going through the height of my pain, I didn't have any guy friends who were really involved in my life. I had friends, of course, and casual acquaintances and people who I would call my friends that we'd hang out with every now and then. But I never had someone looking at me and going, "Tell me genuinely what's going on with you," and call me on my garbage, put a mirror up in front of my face and say, "Actually, you're treating your wife this way, and it's gotta stop." Or, "Hey, throw your arm around me, cry with me. Help me to be brutally honest about what's happening in my life."

So the combination of the pain and the lack of authentic friendships was just devastating for me at that time. I don't know if I would have labeled it as loneliness at the time. Yeah, I can look back on it now and say that was definitely a season of loneliness for me. But I was just like self-pity, you know, self-wallowing. And it's like, nobody gets me. I don't really have any friends. Men, I think in particular, struggle with this when they get to middle age because it's hard to make guy friends who will actually ask you honest questions and go deep with you, who don't always want to stay on the surface level. It's hard to find those people.

Surface level is great. I love talking about football. I love talking about movies. I love joking around and being silly. I love razzing on people and joking, which is why I do that with you, because I love you. But if it's only that and you stay there all the time, your soul will eventually go, "I am starving for something. I am starving for something more. I need actual nutrition." And so we live our lives socially on gas station snack food, really. We just have these little tiny interactions with people. We're scrolling on our phone, and we think that if we text someone and we send them a goofy meme or a gif or something like that, that we're actually connecting with people. But you're just shoving the equivalent of Doritos and Nerds gummy clusters into your mouth all the time. You're not actually getting nutrition the way that you need it.

When I discovered that, I started praying, "Lord, will you, number one, help me to feel better physically? And then will you bring a friend into my life? Will you bring at least just one friend?" And by the grace of God, I met this guy at my church who I kind of knew a little bit before, but we all of a sudden hit it off. We decided to just be honest with one another and communicate gospel truths to one another, but just be brutally honest about what was going on in our lives. It was scary, man, because he was saying some truthful things about what was happening with him, and I was yellow flags, red flags, red flags. This guy needs to work on a lot. And I'm sure he was thinking the same thing about me. But that ended up being a blossoming friendship that to this day, he is one of my best friends.

He just texted me, literally right now. It came through on my iPad. I had this friend who was close, and then I committed with another friend who lives in Virginia. I live in Pennsylvania. We have an hour and a half long conversation once every month. It's on the calendar, it's by the clock. We do it every single time. We don't neglect it. We don't put it off. We ask each other hard questions. We laugh with one another, we pray with one another. And God answered that prayer. It was as simple as, "Lord, will you please bring me some friends?" It was a life preserver, just throwing that up. "Will you help me?" And He did.

Speaker 3

I mean, is that what you would say? Because when you earlier said, man, I was carrying around this pain and I had no one to talk, I thought, that's almost everybody.

In one sense, that is husbands listening right now who feel like there's things they're carrying around they can't even talk to their wife about.

And probably women are feeling the same way.

Speaker 2

Yeah, I think that, too. Dave and I were talking about this topic of loneliness as we were driving in today. And I said, I think my loneliest time was actually when our kids were little and our marriage was struggling. I felt like he was living.

Speaker 3

By the way, thanks, Shelby. That was a great drive in today. I'm like, we were married.

Speaker 2

We were doing great. I was right beside each other, and I felt like we were miles apart. And I think that can happen in marriage.

As you're talking, this book generates so many great conversations about loneliness and the ways we hide from it, as well as the things we do to cope with our loneliness. We're going to get into that.

As listeners, maybe this resonates with you as an adult, whether you're married or single. Perhaps you're thinking, as a wife and a mom, that your husband needs a friend or that your kids could be feeling lonely or struggling.

Today, we're going to address all of those things. Even in your prayer, I can imagine the wife thinking, "I wish my husband just had one friend." You might wish he would pray that prayer, but remember, you can pray it too.

Speaker 1

Yes, you can pray that you can stand in the gap for him.

I remember I was with my wife, having a casual conversation, and a neighbor from a different street came down, and she was talking. My wife and her friends would exercise together every now and then.

Her husband, my wife's friend's husband, is a great guy. He's really fun to be around. He's silly, he's goofy, and he has a lot of bizarre information about movies and television, like what type of television you should buy and all that kind of stuff. He's an interesting guy.

At one point, the woman who is his wife casually mentioned, "Well, my husband doesn't have any friends, so he's always available for..." Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 2

Was he standing beside you?

Speaker 1

No, no, no. He was not here. Okay. Knowing her personality, she probably would have said that if he was there. But when she said that, I was like, huh, is that me? Does my wife say that about me, too? And it made me, like, really evaluate what was going on in my life.

And so it was around the same time that I was just mentioning. And so I was like, I need to be more proactive about this because my wife is really good at staying connected to people. She, like, is loyal. She has friends from high school that she still meets with and communicates with. She's got friends from college that she connects with. And she's got a best friend now who she talks to every day.

What if I had something like that? What if I was just more intentional? I'm intentional about a lot of different things. Men are intentional about what they're intentional about, whether it be working cars, engineering, video games, and with young people. I'm like, you're intentional about Legos, for crying out loud. You put thought and effort into the things that you want to put thought and effort into.

What if I would transfer that kind of energy into building friendships, like genuine friendships with other people who I could really go deep with? And what if you, as a wife, were like, my husband, he's really passionate about X, Y, and Z. What if he took that passion and transferred it on to making friends? And not just guys that you would get together with in a garage, but men who would ask you hard questions, who would be annoying enough to get in your life and ask you what's actually happening and see what happens and see how the Lord provides.

Speaker 3

My first sign is the average guy says, don't sign me up for that. Yeah, because it's fear.

Speaker 1

It's.

Speaker 3

You're afraid they're going to dig into my life. I got sins, I got temptations. I got things that I think about. I don't really want anybody to know. I'm just going to keep those to myself. That's my first thought.

Women may be like, yeah, I want to share that stuff and talk. And again, I don't know if that's true for women more than men, but I know a lot of guys that like the little... What was it in *Get Smart*? A little cone of silence or whatever. The thing around you, you know, I'm gonna be stuck inside here. I can see you, you can see me, but you're not getting inside here.

So what do you say to that guy? Because we both know he needs it. I need it, but he's afraid of it. Because at the end of the day, if some guy, and I really like this guy and we're friends, but if he probes in a little too deep, I don't think I want to go there.

Speaker 1

Yeah, I would ask the question, how's that working out for you? That's a good one. Just, seriously, how's it working out for you? Because you can only self-entertain for so long. You can only watch so many YouTube videos before you're just like, ugh.

I mean, Covid taught us that, right? Everybody, isolation is not a good thing. Every introvert in the world was like, yay, Covid. I get to be by myself for a while and people won't bother me. But several months in, everyone's like, clamoring for authentic connections with people.

Speaker 2

Cause that's how God's made us.

Speaker 1

Yeah, we're made to be meaningfully connected. You are made that way, and you can't run from that. No matter what your personality is. You are made to have genuine connections with people.

Speaker 3

How about the guy?

Speaker 1

Well, I would look at that guy and go, how's it working out for you?

And then I would have a frank conversation and ask his permission to say, hey, do you give me permission to speak into your life? Because I want to give you permission to speak into my life.

Tell me the hard things. Tell me the good things. Let's continue to laugh and have fun and talk about football or whatever, but do I have permission to ask you more in-depth questions, difficult questions?

And if he gives you permission and you give him permission, follow through with that.

Speaker 3

Yeah, go with it.

Speaker 1

It could be scary. Of course it's scary to do that. But why should that stop you? Why should fear be the element that stops you from having the meaningful connections that God has made you?

Speaker 3

What a great day with Shelby.

Speaker 2

I love having Shelby with us and what we talked about. Boy, I feel like it's so important and needed.

Speaker 3

Yeah. And I'm just gonna tell you. Go get his book, familylifetoday.com; you can click on the link in the show notes.

And guess what? We're not done. We're gonna have him back tomorrow. Maybe we'll make him sing again. I think we'll leave that just for one day.

Speaker 2

But it was good.

Speaker 3

It was good. It was better than mine.

Speaker 2

We know life is full of challenges, and families today need biblical truth more than ever. And as a family life partner, your monthly gift helps bring the truth into homes every single day through podcasts, events, and resources.

Speaker 3

So let's make a lasting difference together. Become a partner today. Just go to familylifetoday.com and click the donate button.

Speaker 2

Family Life Today is a donor supported production of Family Life Life, a crew ministry celebrating 50 years of helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.