It's All Right: Hearing God and Finding Happiness Through Heartbreak

By Lauren Little

Widowed at 29 years old, Lauren experienced a great deal of heartbreak that inspired her to reflect on her values and on the trajectory of her life. A believer for a long time, but not fully living for Christ, she decided to recommit her life to Christ as she moved into the next chapter of her life story. This book examines how even though numerous heartbreaks resulted in a downcast soul, Lauren learned how to hear God and discovered how to truly be happy amidst the heartbreak. Lauren’s vulnerable story is an encouragement to anyone experiencing heartbreak as she chronicles her experiences with the death of her husband and then a difficult breakup with the man she thought would be her future husband. Through it all, Lauren became closer to God as she learned what it means to “hear” God. She walks the reader through her process to hear God and provides practical steps and suggestions for others struggling to hear God.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jun 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9781664234024

Lauren Little

LAUREN LITTLE is a Christ follower in North Carolina. She is passionate about women’s spiritual development and about encouraging women to learn about God and strengthen their relationship with Him. She loves to study the Word and learn the truth, and is passionate about helping others learn the truth of the gospel.

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Copyright © 2021 Lauren Little.

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Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International

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ISBN: 978-1-6642-3401-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-3403-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-3402-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021909616

WestBow Press rev. date: 05/27/2021

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1   Young and In Love

Chapter 2   In Sickness and in Health

Chapter 3   Til Death Do Us Part

Chapter 4   Singleness

Chapter 5   Dreams Do Come True

Chapter 6   Hearing God

Chapter 7   Happiness

Epilogue

Introduction

Hi, friend! Thank you for choosing to read this book. I assume that you are reading this book because you were intrigued by the title and that you’re hoping to better understand what it is like to hear God and find happiness through heartbreak. I want to start by saying that I am no expert in the matter of hearing God. This is a concept that I struggled with for a long time and I prayed for so long about as I longed to understand how someone actually heard God. What does God sound like? This is the story of how I finally learned to hear God, and how I found happiness even in the middle of some terrible storms.

My story involves a great deal of heartbreak, as many stories do, which I will share with you in the coming chapters. I realize that everyone experiences heartbreak during the course of their lives, and there are many books that attempt to tell you how to cope with heartbreak and how to get to the other side of your grief. I’ve read a lot of them. There are also many books by Christian authors written as pseudo self-help books, written by people like Lysa Terkeurst, Rachel Hollis, and Jen Hatmaker, which I’ve found extremely helpful in reflecting on my relationship with God and my own self-improvement. This book is a combination of both.

This book is a narrative that explores my journey and experience hearing God. This book is a memoir that reflects my recollections of experiences over time. Some names and identifying characteristics have been changed. I’m not trying to give you the answer to all of your problems, and I can’t guarantee you that by reading this book you will hear God in your own life. Rather, I want to share my story and my experiences with the hope that something in my story might speak to you and that you might see a glimmer of hope in the heartbreak you have in your life. I also hope that what I am going to share in my story may cause you to think differently about hearing God, and that you may come away with some new tools in your tool belt to help you know what it means to hear God and help you better hear God.

We all have challenges, struggles, and heartbreak in life. I want to share some of mine with you so that you will know that you are not alone. Even if and when you feel alone, know that you are never alone or abandoned by our Father, and that you can reach out to Him and He will speak to you. You can find comfort in the Father’s love, even during the hardest periods of your life that seem like they are unbearable. You, too, can hear God.

Thank you for joining me on this journey.

Love,

Lauren

One

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Young and In Love

When I went to college after high school, I was excited for the new adventure, as are most eighteen-year old girls. I was going to school about an hour and a half away from my home, which was far enough away for me to feel like I was on my own. I always loved learning and education, and I was so excited to further my education and learn more in college. I was looking forward to going to college level classes and was so excited to learn more about a subject I loved: history. I was going to be a history teacher! I just knew that I was going to be the history teacher that changed students’ opinions about history, the history teacher who got them excited about the world around them. Neither of my parents graduated from college, so that also contributed to my desire to want to go to and finish college. I was excited to see what a college degree could do for my life. I was ready to take on this new journey.

That said, I did not become a history teacher, and I am not changing peoples’ minds about the world around them by instructing them in a classroom. Plans change, life happens, and our paths stray from what we thought we initially wanted. I honestly don’t think that most people know what they want to do when they are eighteen-years old. For the purposes of this book, it doesn’t matter what I studied in college or that I’m not a history teacher. It just matters that I went to college because my story of hearing God begins in college. I also start this story in college to illustrate that life is a journey. What we plan and what we want, may not actually happen. We make plans, but the Lord determines our steps (Proverbs 16:9).

New Friends?

When I went to college, I was more than a little intimidated by the new social scene. It kind of worried me that I had to make all new friends. I am not a super social or extroverted person. I am very much an introvert, an ISTJ on the Meyers-Brigg personality type indicator. If you aren’t familiar with the Meyers-Brigg test, I highly recommend taking the test. You will learn more about yourself than you thought possible from a personality test, and the results will help you better understand why you are the way you are, if you’ve ever asked that question. Some of the top character traits of ISTJ’s are being reserved (check), practical (check), and quiet (check). That was definitely me. Making new friends was always a challenge for me, and now I was going off to a school with 25,000 people. How was I supposed to find my people while being so reserved, practical, and quiet?

The idea of Greek life appealed to me because it seemed like an organized way to find a group of friends, which really spoke to the practical side of my brain that needs to organize everything. Some may turn their nose up at Greek life and say they’re not real friends if you pay for them and I disagree, but regardless, it is an avenue to meet people. However, I did not want to be a part of the typical Greek life party scene, that I had really only seen in movies and TV shows at this point, so please excuse my ignorance. I mean no offense if you were in a typical sorority in college, it just wasn’t my style. I didn’t like to go out downtown, and I didn’t like to drink a lot. Most importantly, I was a Christian, and even though I was in a new place and didn’t know much about the area or the people, I knew enough to know that I didn’t want to compromise my morals and beliefs for any friends.

I heard about a Christian Sorority from a friend, which seemed strange to me. I did not know there was such a thing as a Christian sorority. The ones I had been exposed to so far did not seem overtly Christian. I am definitely not saying that there are not Christians in typical Greek sororities, I am just saying that generally, sororities do not exist to foster wholesome, Christian community. At least, I had never heard of a sorority that did that. I decided to check out this Christian sorority and see what it was all about. Were they really Christians, or were they just claiming to be Christians for the recognition, and then on the weekends all the girls go out and get drunk and sleep with a bunch of guys?

I was pleasantly surprised to learn that this sorority actually was a Christian sorority. Young women founded the sorority as an organization that was grounded on scripture and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The bylaws for the organization and behavior standards were grounded in scripture, and there was regular Bible study and worship as part of the sorority activities. This was amazing! I was elated! This was the first time I actually had a community of believers to experience life with. I did not grow up with a stable church family or community of believers, and I did not have many Christian friends who encouraged me and held me accountable as a Christian. Now, with this sorority, I had a group of women who shared the same beliefs as me and who encouraged me to grow in my relationship with Jesus.

Involvement in the sorority helped me learn more about the Lord and grow in my relationship with Him while giving me a solid group of new friends in my new college environment. The sorority and activities involved, like regular Bible studies, gave me the opportunity to learn and discuss things that I was learning with other beleivers. I felt confident in my relationship with God and that I was learning more about Him. I was reading the Bible, praying, and talking to God regularly.

Young Love

In preparing to go to college, I applied for and was waitlisted for a scholarship program, and then a few days after I moved into my dorm room, I was awarded the scholarship. All of the other scholarship recipients, however, lived together in a different residence hall, so I already felt like I was missing out and that I was behind because they all knew each other. How was I supposed to make friends with them if they all lived together and were together all the time and I lived in a different residence hall? My introvert tendencies and anxieties were surfacing.

During the first week of college, I had to attend an orientation for this scholarship program. I was nervous to show up at this huge theater which was the location of the program, alone, with all of the other students, none of whom I knew.