Holly Cooke didn’t have one single friend when she moved to London for a job. Her weekends felt miserable. The city itself tops the list for feeling blue—with fifty-five percent of Londoners saying they’re lonely, according to a global survey, compared to just ten percent of residents in neighborly Lisbon, Portugal.

For connection, Holly defied her fears and formed a social media group called The London Lonely Girls Club—and some 35,000 have joined. Small-group meetups every few weeks offer park picnics, art lessons, jewelry workshops, dinners, and even outdoor exercise sessions with puppies.

The challenge of loneliness isn’t new, nor is the Healer of our feelings of isolation.  Our eternal God, wrote David, “sets the lonely in families; he leads out the prisoners with singing” (Psalm 68:6). Asking God to point our way to Christlike friends is a holy privilege and, thus, a request we can freely take to Him. “A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God, in his holy dwelling” (v. 5), added David. “Praise be to the Lord; to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens” (v. 19).

What a friend we have in Jesus! He grants us forever friends, starting with the glorious presence of Himself every moment. As Holly says, “Friend time is good for the soul.”