“How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? Look on me and answer, Lord my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death…But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me.” Psalm 13:1-3, 5-6 In my last post I talked about a time I went through of feeling perceived distance and estrangement from God, doubting what He has done for me. It seems this period of distance and estrangement has continued as, even after baptism and the emotion tied to it, I still feel like I’m missing something. I do not seek to discourage, but only to write what I feel necessary to address. I have written about difficult times in my faith before, and God has always shown up. It seems, however, that the current period has lasted much longer than I would like. Last night I was weighed down with frustration in feeling this estrangement from God. I opened up the Psalms to find a prayer that expressed my cry to God and almost immediately found Psalm 13, which is word for word my prayer. That was no coincidence. It is proof that God hears me. So I wrote a song about it. “‘Will the Lord reject forever? Will he never show his favor again? Has his unfailing love vanished forever? Has his promise failed for all time? Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has he in anger withheld his compassion?' Then I thought, ‘To this I will appeal: the years when the Most High stretched out his right hand. I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago. I will consider all your works and meditate on your mighty deeds.’ Your ways, God, are holy. What god is as great as our God?” Psalm 77:7-13 I speak somewhat often of my fear of repeating my spiritual mistakes from last year. Long story short, I had a shallow relationship with God. I read and reflected on the Bible daily, but never applied it to my life and rarely if ever spoke to God in prayer. I became very judgmental and quickly gave up on God, which led to my mistakes over the summer. There is a stark difference between this year and last year, however, and in this difference I find confidence: my faith is no longer one of many options—it is the air I breathe. What I mean by that is this: last year, I had just come back from experiencing a beautiful encounter with God in Australia. It was wonderful to feel Him so closely, much more wonderful than life without that closeness, so I chose to pursue faith. When that closeness did not repeat itself, I gave up. I had lived just fine without that closeness before, right? I was only in it for my benefit. This year, I am once again distraught in the lack of closeness I have felt recently. But this year, I have no other options to turn to. God is sustaining me, completely. Though I feel not His immediate presence, I am well aware that I would crumble under the weight of my sins if He was not holding my burden even now as I feel distant. Sometimes it is difficult to breathe. Perhaps we are sick and our nose is stuffed up, or maybe we (like myself) have asthma. Does this mean we can, in our frustration, just give up and stop breathing? That would be absolutely absurd. So, continuing with the above analogy, my nose is stuffed up. I have not been able to breathe as smoothly as I once did. But I am confident in this: God has been faithful. His love is unfailing. His promises endure forever, and I have hard evidence of how He has shown up miraculously in my past. Though this spiritual “sickness” in the form of perceived distance and estrangement may last for a while, He will not hide His face from me forever. So I will patiently wait. “Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” Psalm 27:14
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AuthorFighting complacency and advocating change in myself for the world around me. Posts by Date
February 2019
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