Podcast: Help! I’m Feeling Lonely at Christmas (Lydia Brownback)

December 15, 2025 by: Crossway

This article is part of the The Crossway Podcast series.

When You Feel Lonely at Christmas

Lydia Brownback addresses the ways that the holidays can heighten the feelings of loneliness, how you can use your time well when this happens, and gives practical advice for helping others in your community and church feel cared for.

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Finding God in My Loneliness

Finding God in My Loneliness

Lydia Brownback

Lydia Brownback offers biblical encouragement for women to help them see how God can redeem seasons of loneliness and draw them to the only true and lasting remedy: union with Jesus.

Topics Addressed in This Interview:

00:28 - Imagination vs. Reality

Matt Tully
Lydia Brownback is an author and Bible teacher and serves as director of women’s Bible resources at Crossway. Her books include the Flourish Bible Study Series and Finding God in My Loneliness. Lydia, thanks for joining me again on The Crossway Podcast.

Lydia Brownback
It’s great to be back with you, Matt.

Matt Tully
Christmas is just around the corner, and for many it’s the most wonderful time of the year. But for others, the Christmas season can bring challenges sometimes, especially for those who feel the pangs of loneliness and isolation at Christmastime. And you actually open your book, Finding God in My Loneliness, with a story of talking to a neighbor one day a few years back. So I wonder if you can take us back to that moment and then read that passage from your book.

Lydia Brownback
It had snowed that morning, we were cleaning off our cars, and I asked her what she’d be doing this weekend. Matt, I’ll read the story here at the opening of the book.

The unexpected snowfall brought the neighborhood together as we worked to clear cars and walkways before the early December sunset. “Looks like winter is here!” I called over to my friend next door. “Indeed it is!” she replied. “And the timing of all this snow is perfect. After supper we’re going to make hot chocolate and decorate the Christmas tree. The kids are really excited.” As I stood there picturing her happy family scene, I was suddenly buried under an avalanche of overwhelming loneliness. For the first time ever, I decided against getting a Christmas tree that year. The thought of having no one with whom to unwrap each memory-laden ornament from its tissue-paper hibernation was just too depressing. A casual conversation was all it took.

Matt Tully
As you think back on that moment a few years back now, why do you think that that small comment had such an effect on you?

Lydia Brownback
Well, Matt, I think some of it has to do with the fact that I’m single. I was picturing what my friend had, and the contrast to what I didn’t have was so stark. I was comparing in my own mind and heart. And what I didn’t realize at the time, of course, was that the way I was picturing that happy family scene that she was about to go enjoy, a lot of it was really just an imagination. I did ask her about that later. I said, “I decided not to get a Christmas tree. And quite honestly, it was after picturing your scene that mine seemed kind of lonely and empty.” And she said, “Well, let me tell you how that really goes. I get out all the ornaments, I make the cocoa, and the kids wander in, reluctantly setting their phones aside. They hang one ornament on the tree, eat a cookie, and leave. I end up decorating the tree all by myself every year.” That’s the reality. You paint this beautiful picture, and I think everyone in the family has these expectations of what it’s going to look like. But that isn’t the reality. For someone out on the outside looking in, that’s what you’re picturing, but it’s never the reality.

Matt Tully
It can be easier to fall into that trap of the greener-grass dynamic, where we assume other people have this kind of perfect reality. But I think there is something true there in terms of feeling that lack, feeling that loneliness and isolation. Speak a little bit to your own experience of loneliness over the years.

Lydia Brownback
A lot of it has come from what I think are these unrealistic expectations that we were just talking about there. If we look at someone else’s life and compare it to our own, we’re all going to feel lonely. I think that’s especially true when it comes to the holidays, or for single people, or for people who are isolated or alone for whatever reason. Their loneliness is enhanced by instead of looking at what they have, they look at what others are enjoying—or what they perceive they’re enjoying. That was a battle for me for a long time. My friend really helped set me straight there. And then also just looking at saying if the Lord has drawn these lines around my life, then what does he have for me in this? I may feel lonely, and maybe I am lonely, but it does that mean I’m alone? Does that mean I’m cut off? Does that mean I have less than others who have busy, buzzing families decorating Christmas trees? No. There’s a richness in what the Lord has provided in my own life. It can be a battle to get there. And I do think that we’re not meant to live these isolated lives, and that includes the holidays.

Matt Tully
In addition to singleness, another cause of loneliness that that many of us will experience is related to the loss of somebody that we loved, whether that’s a spouse, a child, a close friend, or some other family member.

Lydia Brownback
Yeah. You think about if you’ve lost a family member, a spouse, a child, a parent, a sibling, and so many traditions around the holidays are associated with those lost loved ones. And often for years—decades—we’ve done the same traditions every year. And suddenly, we’re having to do them without our loved one, and we feel the absence so keenly then.

Matt Tully
It’s like the holidays bring those feelings back to the fore for some reason.

Lydia Brownback
Oh yeah. My mother died a couple of years ago, and I’ve not been able to get a Christmas tree since then. (I’m hoping to this year.) The reason is that having to unwrap the ornaments that were part of my childhood and that were on my mother’s tree every year, to have to pull them out and hang them up, I’m afraid of the emotion and just that I will feel the loss of her so keenly. Talk about lonely. She’s gone. And here’s a reminder of the fact that I don’t have her there. So it can make the holidays really painful.

Matt Tully
When it comes to confronting that pain that we often feel when we do feel disconnected from people in general or certain people in particular, do you feel like you’ve learned things about that pain and how to confront it in healthy, appropriate ways versus trying to avoid it?

Lydia Brownback
I think that just trying to crush it out doesn’t work. We’re not just supposed to paste a smile on and keep busy. Busyness can be a way to avoid it or escape it, but it doesn’t deal with it. Primarily, we have the Lord to comfort us, and I think the best thing to do is to just lean into the fact that we’re feeling that way. Whether it’s loneliness or the pain of loss—whatever the painful emotion is—don’t be afraid of it. Go to the Lord with it. Lean into it and just cry out with honesty about this and take it to the Lord and pray for help. Cry out for comfort. Cry out just to know his companionship with you as you’re dealing with it. And then also I think we don’t want to stay isolated. We want to be with our Christian brothers and sisters. We want to be with our friends. We want to have at least one good friend we can call and say, I’m hurting so much right now. And I think about that first Christmas without my mother, and I did try to pull all the Christmas decorations out. I just broke down, picked up the phone, and called a friend, and she just let me cry and just pour out my pain. And I didn’t need her to do anything except listen and be there. That’s one of the times where we do need our friends—through grief, through loneliness, through those seasons of feeling emotions that we don’t know quite how to process on our own, but we’re not sure where to go for help or how to get help.

Matt Tully
That seems like one of the tricky things about loneliness is that at times it can actually drive us towards isolation. We can almost pull back in these feelings rather than move towards other people. Have you experienced that?

Lydia Brownback
Yeah. There’s a vulnerability in having to move toward others, and we’re exposing ourselves. We’re exposing a weakness. There’s always the risk of rejection when we do that, or the risk that our friend won’t understand. Or there’s the risk that people we turn to will have a pat answer and just say, You need to pray more. Where’s your faith?—or something that’s just going to pour salt in the wound. But we need to step out anyway, because in turning away in that self-protective isolation, we’re only entrenching our loneliness.

Matt Tully
What are some of the examples of unhelpful things that other maybe well-meaning Christians have said to you over the years that you would say just weren’t actually very helpful?

Lydia Brownback
I think sometimes people will recognize single people or others who are alone around the holidays. I’m thinking especially of the holidays right now and how they want to help, they’re trying, and you look at them and you’re grateful for their efforts. But they don’t recognize that sometimes they’re not helping.

Matt Tully
You can appreciate the heart, but maybe the execution is not quite right.

Lydia Brownback
Right. One year a family came up to me at the end of a church service and said, “Hey, tomorrow’s Christmas. Why don’t you come over and have dinner with our family if you’ve got nothing to do.” And I thought, first of all, it’s the day before Christmas, and probably by now I’ve made some plans. I know that you mean well, but it’s like a pity invite, in a way. That doesn’t make lonely people feel wanted; it makes them feel pitied. And I think the best thing to do that, if you want to include, is to be aware of it ahead of time.

Matt Tully
How could that invite have been shared with you in a way that wouldn’t have felt like a pity invite and would’ve felt more intentional and helpful?

Lydia Brownback
I don’t want to sound ungrateful for such an imitation. You’re noticed, at least, but I think the way to make an individual feel wanted is to think ahead two or three weeks and say, “Hey, we’d love to have you come because my child loves how you bake cookies. Would you bring those cookies?” So then you’re giving dignity to the person. You’re also acknowledging something about the person that they can actually contribute.

Matt Tully
You’re not just inviting them over because they’re lonely.

Lydia Brownback
Exactly. It’s not because they’re alone or single or you just feel bad for them for some reason. It’s because you want that person to be there. For people who are lonely, pity doesn’t really help them, and they can always see through it. And again, it doesn’t mean we’re not grateful to be noticed and to be included. Of course we want that, but we want to know that we actually have something to contribute to your gathering.

Matt Tully
I could imagine how it could be difficult if it feels like your identity is wrapped up in this loneliness or in this singleness or whatever it might be, if people are primarily viewing you through that lens rather than as a person. or as a fellow brother or a sister in Christ to who has things to share and give others. That could be a hard thing to reduce someone down to just that.

Lydia Brownback
And it can actually create more loneliness. You think about Jesus and how Zacchaeus was this tax collector that nobody liked. He was very unpopular. And when Jesus was walking through town one day, Zacchaeus, who was a tiny little man, wasn’t visible. He couldn’t see over the crowd to see Jesus, so he climbed up in a tree. And what did Jesus do? He looked up and said, “Zacchaeus, come down, for I must have dinner at your house today.” Well, what did that do? It gave Zacchaeus, this unloved, lonely man—and granted, he was lonely by his own bad choices, but still he was lonely. And Jesus dignified him in front of the crowd by not just calling him by name but inviting himself over for dinner. And so it was actually saying to Zacchaeus, I want you to do something for me. Cook a meal. Show me hospitality. And so I think there’s a lot to be seen from how he dealt with this situation.

Matt Tully
But maybe the application isn’t to go and invite yourself over to every single person’s home this holiday season.

Lydia Brownback
No, no, no. Definitely not. It’s not even about going over to someone’s home for dinner, a meal, or a holiday occasion. It’s about noticing individuals and acknowledging that they’re contributing members of the body of Christ. They, in their individuality, matter. They have something to offer.

13:26 - God Redeems Loneliness

Matt Tully
Early in the book, you write, “Loneliness isn’t something to fear but something that God redeems.” I wonder if you could unpack that a little bit. What do you mean by that? How have you seen God redeem your own experiences of loneliness over the course of your life?

Lydia Brownback
I’ve learned this about the fact that God redeems it by going through it. When we’re feeling lonely, it is a scary feeling. It’s fearful. We want to run from it. We have a choice when it’s upon us. We can try to escape it, and I think that can be people’s default. Lonely times—think about dark evenings. It’s not necessarily a holiday, but it’s the end of the workday when people aren’t busy anymore. The busyness of the day, the errands, the work, everything is kind of quieted down. And there are these hours between dinner and bedtime where you kind of have some downtime. Well, that’s when loneliness can really hit, when you’re not preoccupied with the busyness of the day. So how do you handle it? You can escape. You can just click through, stream something, binge-watch something—killing the hours between dinner and bedtime rather than filling those hours. So the fear of loneliness makes you kill time just to escape it. But if we want to fill it, what we can do is sit there in that loneliness and in that moment, and instead of running from the fear, go to the Lord with it. And just be uncomfortable in that moment and say, Help me. I don’t know how to deal with this. I don’t know how to handle this. And I see no end in sight because tonight is going to be just like tomorrow night and the next night. What do I do with this? And I think that’s the first step is just don’t run from it; run to the Lord with it. And it’s going to look different for everyone in terms of practically how things change. I know in my own life, it’s just taken away the fear of nighttime.

Matt Tully
What has God done? How has God met you as you’ve tried to take those feelings to him rather than numb them?

Lydia Brownback
I had to take them to the Lord at the same time I’m disciplining myself to stop the numbing behaviors. And for me, it was just finding something to stream that I could just click through for two and a half hours until bed. And it just was such a waste of life. So instead, I’ll get up and do something constructive. And it doesn’t mean I have to work or be productive. It just means even in my recreational hour or two, am I doing something that isn’t escapist? I think it’s all about the motive there. And I know for me it can be something like make a batch of cookies, because I’m just in my own head with the Lord there. It is going to look different for everyone. Maybe it’s read a book. Reading a book can be one of the hardest things because it’s quiet. It’s nighttime, it’s quiet, and you can keenly feel the aloneness then. But don’t run from it. Invite the Lord in. And over time we do find his fellowship and his presence with us. And then also it gets us out of our own head. So we realize what we can do with those hours is maybe love somebody else who’s even lonelier than we are. When we’re just escaping and running, we’re still pretty self-consumed. If we’re willing to sit in that space and invite the Lord into it, we’re comforted. We realize we’re not really alone, because he’s with us. And suddenly, we’re directed outward and upward, and we can recognize that there are people who are lonelier than we are or who are just as in need of companionship and encouragement. And we can take some of that time where we’re so afraid of the dark and the aloneness, and reach out to them.

Matt Tully
I’d imagine that it can be pretty tempting in seasons of loneliness to get stuck in those feelings and give into a form of self-pity. So how do you resist getting stuck in those feelings?

Lydia Brownback
I’ve learned, when they start to come upon me, that I am curving inward. And sometimes it’s just the act of doing before I even feel any different. It’s reaching out to a friend—not to say, Comfort me, but to say, How can I pray for you? or Let’s get together for a walk and listening and entering into her life. And the way out for me at least has been get into someone else’s life. That just stops in its tracks that curve inward that just makes loneliness worse and kind of gets you in this dark pit.

Matt Tully
Have you ever wrestled with feeling like, God, why did you put me in this situation? Why are you allowing me to feel these things night after night, season after season?

Lydia Brownback
Yeah. This is where Paul’s thorn in the flesh has really come into play in my life, especially during the pandemic. That was the hardest season of loneliness I’ve ever gone through. We’re working at home, and my work is sedentary and quiet. So it’s quiet all day, and then I’m facing evenings with the same—day after day. And then I think, I’m going to be going through three more days like this or four more days before I see another human being. I remember when the shutdown happened how no one saw anybody for a long time. And the first time a friend and I finally met up to go for a walk, probably six weeks into it, we just broke all protocol and gave each other a hug. And I burst into tears because it was the first time I’d had human touch in six weeks. And it’s amazing how we don’t realize how just hugs from a friend or even handshakes—human touch—is just a big part of life. I did go through some bitterness and wrestling, especially during that time, with the Lord. I had to say, Lord, deliver me from this! I pleaded with him, We’re not meant to live like this! I’m so alone and isolated. And yet he’s the one who allowed that situation in my life. And I think about what Jesus said to Paul when he pleaded with the Lord to remove his thorn. And Jesus said, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness." And so how did Paul come out of that? He embraced and accepted God’s ordering of his life, and accepted the lingering of that thorn, so that he was able to say, I will then boast in how God has ordered my life—even in the things that are difficult, because when I am weak, then I am strong. So I’ve come to believe and trust that if the Lord has kept this thorn of a lot of alone time in my life—more than I want—then it must be good, or he wouldn’t allow it. He would remove it. Instead, he wants me to know the sufficiency of his grace and the strength of his grace. And when I am willing to trust him, I do experience those things.

20:21 - The Role of Lament

Matt Tully
As we lean into those feelings and not try to ignore them or push them aside, what role could lament play in our lives? Have you found lament to be a helpful resource for you?

Lydia Brownback
Yeah. I would call it getting real and not escaping. It’s the honesty that it’s hard and it hurts. And so my way of thinking of lament is just to be honest about those feelings. I feel lonely. And the psalms are such a help in these times. We see loneliness in the psalmists, and what are they doing with it? These are cries to the Lord of the reality of their circumstances, the pain of the circumstances, and how often they’re unrelenting, and there’s just no end in sight. So we can lament, and I think it’s right to lament, because it’s honest.

Matt Tully
It is so helpful because we can feel the pain and we can struggle with these feelings and still be trusting the Lord. Trust doesn’t always mean that it gets easy.

Lydia Brownback
No. Definitely not. In fact, real trust is saying, Even when it doesn’t, God, you’re good. And I believe you’re good. And I believe you’re being good to me. We can say God is good with this theological, ivory-tower-understanding of his character, but real trust, real faith is believing that God is being good to us, whatever our circumstances. And so it’s not contradictory to be real about how much it hurts while also saying, God, I know you’re being good to me. They go together.

21:58 - What the Body of Christ Is Meant For

Matt Tully
Maybe as a final question, Lydia, you’ve shared some examples of unhelpful things people have said over the years. What are some examples of really helpful, encouraging things that other Christians have done for you over the years, especially around the holiday season, that might be something for us to all consider?

Lydia Brownback
It’s almost the exact same thing as my negative example. I have some families, some friends, who have incorporated me into their family life, where it’s an assumption that I’m included. And I know that if the holiday comes and I’m going to be on my own, they’re going to say, “Of course you’re not. You’re coming over.” And they want me there. Their children call me Aunt, and I love being a part of it. So I think it’s being embraced by someone, and not just, Oh, I happen to be alone on that day. We don’t want our friends just to be like us. Everyone doesn’t have to be just like us. Lonely people can feel like, Well, I can only be friends with other single people or other lonely people. No, be friends with other Christians, and find those who will embrace you in their life over the long haul. And that’s really it—it’s those friends over the long haul, where you’re a part of each other’s lives, and then there’s a lot less loneliness.

Matt Tully
And that’s where the local church is so foundational for that, because what other community do we have where we can be around people who are very different from us—different life stages, different ages, different family setups—who are, nevertheless, united together with us in Christ in a really powerful way.

Lydia Brownback
It is meant for that. The church is meant for that. And that’s the first thing I say to lonely people—and it’s what I’ve found myself—is God designed the church to be our family. That is, you think about Psalm 68:8: “The Lord sets the solitary in a home [or in families.]” That’s what the church is. And when you’re in a sound Bible church, it functions the way the New Testament outlines. That’s what happens. And there’s a love that goes with that, an acceptance with one another there. And it doesn’t matter—we’re not dividing by demographic, where all the men are over here and the teenagers are over here. And certainly, you have those groups, but as a body, when you gather on a weekly basis, you’re one big family. And when there’s a need, people rally, they get together. And then you find your people within that church body who become the special people in your life. But I would say that’s the remedy. And if you’re lonely and isolated because you don’t have a good church, it’s worth changing your life to get that. That is God’s will. The Christian life is not meant to be lived alone. And that is a prayer he delights to answer. If you have to change your life to get a church, God will bless that. He’ll bless that effort. That is the core in this life of where we’re meant to find this balm for our hurting, lonely souls.

Matt Tully
What would you say to somebody who is feeling lonely? Maybe they would say, I think I am in a good church. It’s a Bible-preaching, gospel-believing church, but I still feel lonely. I don’t feel like I have these connections. What can they do? What would be the first step they could take this season?

Lydia Brownback
I think one of the things is when you go into a church, don’t wait for someone to come find you. I think about my mother, who was also a single woman for a lot of years. Every Sunday she would go to church, and the first thing she’d do when she got there was look for someone sitting alone. She would go sit down with them, introduce herself, and just sit with that person through the service. So she was doing that out of knowing what it felt like to be alone in church. So her remedy was to go look for someone else who was lonely and go love that person by sitting with them. It helped that other person and it also alleviated our own loneliness. So I think that is the great thing. Go in knowing you have this pain, and then seek to solve it in someone else. And it’s amazing how counterintuitively you’re loving someone else and you’re going to be solving your own loneliness too. So that’s my suggestion: Don’t wait for someone to come solve it for you. Pour yourself out for someone else.

Matt Tully
Beautiful. Lydia, I wonder if you can just close us here today by just praying for those who are listening. Maybe somebody is right now, as they’re listening, feeling lonely. And maybe in particular as they think about this Christmas season coming up, they’re just feeling that pang of sadness and isolation. Could you close us by praying for that person?

Lydia Brownback
Lord, we thank you that you meet us in our loneliness. We think of those right now who are maybe in the dark of a winter night, thinking ahead to the holidays and being lonely. Lord, we thank you that you sent your Son to come in and be light into the darkness. You came and brought joy and peace and light. And we pray that that light would break into the loneliness of someone’s darkness this very day and during this holiday season. We pray that they would find the fulfillment, the fullness of life in Christ, and that you would lead your lonely people into deep fellowship, rich fellowship, new friendships. Lord, we ask that you would lead them to find the remedy for their loneliness that only you can provide. We ask it in Jesus’s name.

Matt Tully
Amen.

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