Journey into Light

I tried really hard this week to fix a medical problem that has lingered on for quite some time. I prayed and then called the doctor’s office twice to try to get an appointment.

I got nowhere. No return calls and no appointment. Meanwhile, I grew increasingly anxious about my medical problem.

I was frustrated. Where was God? Why wasn’t he helping me?

During the week I spent some time meditating and talking to God through Psalm 139.

Here is what he said to me through this psalm, “I know what is going on in your life. I am all over your medical problem. I carefully watch over you and I will guide you as far as what you need to do regarding your healing.”

Well, you could have fooled me! God seemed awfully distant and otherwise preoccupied.

But this is the life that God wants us to live. He wants us to “see” him throughout the day, even if everything in us and around us is screaming that he is not there. “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).

He promises that he is always with us (Hebrews 13:5), and sometimes that is our only assurance that he is. Other times we can “see” him in our circumstances, in answered prayer, and in a word of encouragement from a friend.

So, what we have here is really an awareness problem. We are like Jacob who said, “Surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know it” (Genesis 28:16).

Why then do we have this God awareness problem? Why do we often fail to sense his presence throughout the day?

Probably the main reason is that we do not want to. We do not want God messing with the details of our lives. Often, only when life gets too painful are we motivated to allow the reality of “his very present help” (Psalm 46:1) to seep into our awareness.

In closing, where have you seen God in your life today? Thank him for his watchful care and invite him into the details of your life for the rest of the day.