Are feeling that God has withdrawn from you today? this week?  this month?  this year?

This is how Floyd McClung, the senior pastor of Metro Church, Kansas describes the feeling…

You wake up one morning and all your spiritual feelings are gone. You pray, but nothing happens. You rebuke the devil, but it doesn’t change anything. You go through spiritual exercises … you have your friends pray for you … you confess every sin you can imagine, then go round asking forgiveness of everyone you know. You fast … still nothing. You begin to wonder how long this spiritual gloom might last. Days? Weeks? Months? Will it ever end? … it feels as if your prayers simply bounce off the ceiling. In your desperation, you cry out, “What’s the matter with me?”

If you are feeling this way…. God has a word for you today…

There is never a moment when I am absent from the scene of your life.  Your feeling of separation does not make it so.  It is like the sunshine.  Clouds enshroud the earth and you say the sun is not shining.  This is not true.  The sun is always shining.  The truth is that because it is a cloudy day, you cannot see the sun shining.  Even so, My grace is always pouring down upon you, and in moments when your own spirit may not discern it, My love is nonetheless constant and real.

Your joy may be restored at any moment as you brush aside the clouds of earth by recapturing the strength of the times when you have felt the warmth of the sunshine, yes, even been blinded by the power of its rays.      Excerpt from On the Highroad of Surrender by Frances J. Roberts.

If you find yourself feeling alone and withdrawn from God… please do three things…

1. Be honest with God and tell him exactly how you feel.  Model David in the book of Psalms and pour out your heart to God.  (Psalm 62.8)
2. TRUST Him… Don’t just Believe in God… BELIEVE that he will do exactly as He has promised in His word… never leave you. (Hebrews 13.5)
3. PRAISE Him through the drought.  (Psalm 71.14  Psalm 34.1)

Your Praising God will not only release His mercy and grace but it will move you closer to gaining a full glimpse of Him.  God never leaves… it’s we who do the moving.  The only way to right the situation is to continue seeking Him and praising Him through it all… not for what He is doing, but for who He is… faithful, omnipotent, everlasting, pure, true, fair, shelter, shepherd, etc.  Read more on starting each day with Praise.  

Psalm 62.8

Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge.

Hebrews 13.5

Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

Psalm 71.14

As for me, I will always have hope; I will praise you more and more.

Psalm 34.1

I will extol the LORD at all times; his praise will always be on my lips. 

 

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