These past few days I’ve been asking the question “Where are you God???!!” Right now I need direction in my life. I’m needing to feel that even though ahead of me looks horrible and the situations I’m not wanting to deal with look like they will never get better he will make a way but saying it and believing it are two different things. I need to hear the voice of God. You always hear people talking about how you must press in and find him that is true but sometimes as humans we always take the easy road and sometimes give up. I feel like giving up on a lot right now but know I can’t. That doesn’t mean that the thought isn’t there and that I’m just doing so wonderful and not a care in the world please I hate when people try to put on a front of perfection in every area of their life.
God is the Creator of the universe who yearns for us to know Him. That is why we are all here. It is His desire that we rely on and experience His strength, love, justice, holiness and compassion. So He says to all who are willing, "Come to me."
Unlike us, God knows what will happen tomorrow, next week, next year, the next decade. He says, ("I am God, and there is no one like me, declaring the end from the beginning."1) He knows what will happen in the world. More importantly, He knows what will occur in your life and can be there for you, if you've chosen to include Him in your life. He tells us that He can be ("our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in times of trouble."2) But we must make a sincere effort to seek Him. He says, "You will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart."3 That doesn't mean that those who know God will escape difficult times. They won't. One follower of Jesus Christ put it this way: "We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed."4 Reality tells us that we will experience problems in life. However, if we go through them while knowing God, we can react to them with a different perspective and with a strength that is not our own. No problem has the capacity to be insurmountable to God. He is bigger than all the problems that can hit us, and we are not left alone to deal with them.
God's Word tells us, ("The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in him."5 And, "The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. He fulfills the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cry and saves them."6)
Many of us -- no, all of us -- choose at times to stiff-arm God and His ways. Compared to others,we might consider ourselves to be respectable, loving people. But in the raw honesty of our own hearts, if we were to face God, it would be with the knowledge of our sin. As we begin to address God in prayer, are we not caught short, paused by the sense that God is well aware of our thoughts, actions and self-centeredness? We have...by our lives and actions...distanced ourselves from God. We have often lived like we could run our lives just fine without Him. The Bible says that "We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way."13 The consequences? Our sin has separated us from God, and it affects more than this life. The penalty for our sin is death, or eternal separation from God. However, God has provided a way for us to be forgiven and know Him.
God knows the pain and suffering we encounter in this world. Jesus left the safety and security of His home, and entered the hard environment we live in. Jesus got tired, knew hunger and thirst, battled accusations from others and was ostracized by family and friends. But Jesus experienced far more than daily hardships. Jesus, the Son of God in human form, willingly took all of our sin on Himself and paid our penalty of death. "In this is love, that he laid down his life for us."15 He went through torture, dying a slow, humiliating death of suffocation on a cross, so that we could be forgiven.
Jesus told others ahead of time that He would be crucified. He said that three days after His death He would come back to life, proving that He is God. He didn't say He would reincarnate someday. (Who would know if He actually did it?) He said three days after being buried He would show Himself physically alive to those who saw His crucifixion. On that third day, Jesus' tomb was found empty and many people testified to seeing Him alive.
Jesus Christ said, "My peace I give to you; not as the world gives, do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world."30 He promises never to fail us or forsake us."
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