Where is God?

O my God, my soul is cast down within me;

Therefore I will remember you from the land

of the Jordan,

and from the heights of Hermon, from the Hill Mizar.

Psalm 42:6

 

I have been asking this question a lot lately.  Where is God?  Why do my prayers go unanswered?  Will my dreams never come true?  On a recent sleepless and troubled night, after reading a very distressing email from a friend (distressing in that it pinpointed an area of my life that I didn't want to be reminded of), I found my self is the above area of the book of Psalms.  Starting in chapter 41 through around chapter 50, it was like the psalmist had been reading my mind.  I had been fighting what I knew I needed to do.  I didn't want to pray if God was going to say no anyway.  I didn't want to read my Bible because I knew what I would be reading.  I just wanted to quit everything and try to do things my own way.  That night, I didn't feel like the struggle was worth it, and I really needed to get some sleep, so I cracked open the Bible (more like the Bible app on my phone) and I heard God speak.  In the 42nd chapter of Psalms, there is crying and tears and wonder at where God is.  In chapter 44, the psalmist recalls the deeds God did for the prior Christians.  This is where God spoke to me.  Remember.  I need to remember the deeds of God in my own life.  And tonight as I type this, I need to remember the deeds of God in my family.  So I will remember a few here tonight, to remind myself that God is still here, and He will answer my prayers in His own time. 

 

REMINDERS:

• The salvation of my grandfather: without this I most likely would not be in church today.
• OBU: the biggest dream of my childhood was to attend this university, God was with me throughout.
• Paris: I had the privilege of sharing the Eternal Light in the City of Lights! Merci a Dieu!
• Hello!  I have the best niece and nephews an aunt could ask for!
• The breakdown on the turnpike on my way back from college, a ride from someone who just happened to live 5 min from my hometown.
• salvation for friends I have long prayed for

 

The list would be too long to keep going.  I have to hang onto these reminders as there are some areas of my life right now where I need the reminders to keep going.  Everything in me just wants to quit and give up, but it's going to take prayer and God to get me through and keep me going.  I can't let the darkness win.  I have got to keep heading into the light. 

 

I will lie down in peace and sleep, for You, Oh Lord, make me dwell in safety. Psalm 4:8

Thoughts borrowed from a friend

Recently, a friend on Facebook posted a couple of very deep and true thoughts on Facebook.  I have had the pleasure of knowing this woman for a long time.  She has only been a Christian for a few years.  Her salvation was one of the things on my top 10 prayer list for a long time, and a reminder that God answers prayer (even though it might not be on our time or in the way we expect).  Anyway, I asked if she would mind me sharing her thoughts here and she said OK.  So here goes:

Yesterday as I was leaving the Doctors office the nurse patted me on the back and said"God never gives you more then you can handle". These are my thoughts on this widely used statement: God does give us more then we can handle,and he does it on purpose. We as humans naturally fix what we have the ability to fix. Most of us do not ask for help unless we need it. If you can move your couch to clean... underneath it you push it out of the way without much thought,only asking for assistance if it is too heavy . God wants us to turn to Him with our problems there for at times making our problems big enough that we HAVE to ask his Help. God wants to work miracles in our lives and he can not do that if we can work things out for ourselves. God wants to be able to shine though us and our lives though His acts . 2 Corinthians 12:9 says "“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” For this too be true we need to be weak for his power to shine . Philippians 4:13 says " I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me" .THROUGH is the key word here. We can do Nothing on our own without His help. God sent Gideon into battle after shuffling though his warriors until so few were left that everyone would see that only God could win. God parted the Red Sea allowing Moses and the Israelites to survive a humanly impossible situation. If Moses could have lead them without help I am sure he would have with out much thought.

 

 Here's another post from my friend:

 

Today in Sunday School we were talking about the Wise Men searching for baby Jesus and it dawned on me that we are much like them.  Wise? No, I won't begin to claim that.  Only the people who were willing to look were able to see Jesus.  Many of us are lost, floundering around looking for our Saviour when He is right here surrounding us all.  Only the people willing to look are able to see Him.  When I go into nature, I see God everywhere.  IT IS EASY TO SEE HIM everywhere when everything is fresh and clean, still and good.  My problem is when things are bad, I forget to look.  God never leaves me, or anyone for that matter.  It is me who forgets to look and see Him.  He isn't in the people or the situation that is making me upset but close with me, guiding me.  Our world is not unlike when Jesus was born.  We have a lot to learn from the Wise Men.

 

I need say no more.  These excellent thoughts say enough on their own.