I feel like I’m moving through sludge.
I plod through my task list like a dead robot.
- Call this person.
- Empty the trash
- Go to this meeting
- Empty more trash
I keep hitting refresh on Reddit just hoping for a new story to avoid doing anything. This week can’t end fast enough. But it grinds on for a seeming eternity.
This is the desert.
I think you end up here more often than you actually go here.
It’s a place of nothing.
All the resonance of the world and universe are gone. They have left you. You can’t hear anything. The world and God are telling you nothing. It’s just you and the vast expanse of nothing.
There were some verses found written on the wall in Mother Teresa’s home for children in Calcutta. You can click here and read them all. But a couple jump at me in this time in my life:
- What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
- Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
This is Mother Teresa we’re talking about here. This isn’t some schlub like me. She was an actual woman of God. I’m quite sure she spent much time in this barren wasteland of spiritual nothingness.
When you get to this point I am telling you: it feels like God has left you. You listen. You ask. And all you get is radio silence.
But the truth is actually different.
The problem is, God’s radio signal is really weak. God is calling from a trillion miles away and a dimension you can’t even possibly imagine.
When you are in a place like the place I am today there is simply too much static. Too much ego. Too much fatigue. Too much anxiety. You are surrounded by too much noise.
God hasn’t left me. I left God.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t blame myself. I’m just in a trash compactor of bullshit at the moment. I’m finding it hard to even appreciate the dollar menu at Taco Bell right now. I can’t find resonance anywhere.
But even more crazy, God is talking to me right now. I know it. God hasn’t gone anywhere. I just can’t hear it.
I didn’t come here to give you a “whoa is me” post. You are all so wonderful. You have so much love and kindness and compassion. I know you love me.
I wrote this to those of you who find yourselves in this place from time to time. Maybe you’re right here with me now.
Sometimes you just have to sit in the muck. There’s no chance in hell you are going to get out of it today, no matter how much you might wish otherwise.
Just sit here. Struggling just makes it worse.
Sleep, if you can. Eat, if you can. Drink water, if you can. But most of all, have faith that God has indeed not forsaken you. Even if you don’t believe in God, that’s cool. You can’t leave the universe and the universe can’t leave you. We are all one. We are all loved.
Just believe it. That’s a fact you can take to the bank.
(Oh. And January sucks.)
Comments
4 responses to “God, why have you forsaken me?”
I loved last night …like a family gathering ….with games…lol…I got my book signed …I came home and was reading their stories to John. Some sad…some very interesting moments people go through…some happy endings. It makes me wonder if I am giving of my time enough …if I am doing enough? I liked the one you wrote concerning the water situation. I have heard the saying ‘you can’t beat a good man down”… THEY can try to knock the confidence out of a person , beat him up PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY, but hopefully he will keep on getting up. Basically fall down 7 …get up 8. I just have to keep asking myself …why? I feel if we do not know what to do about a situation …and then just don’t do anything ..we are only giving up. Of all the things my mother taught me was ‘giving up” was not an option.
Jeremiah 3:33… Call out to me and I will answer you. God never seems to work fast enough for us But he is always on time . Satan tries to distract us and make us feel that God is not near. There were many times I felt like I was thrown into a pit with no flashlight and no ladder and I didn’t know how to get out. Call out to him for his outstretched hand. He will never leave you or deceive you even though deception seems to be all around us at times. Take time to listen. Shut everyone else out… Go sit in a church or on a park bench or in the woods. You have been a father to the homeless and many times when our children are hurting we feel hopeless and helpless. Jesus’s mother felt the same way when she saw her son being crucified come a spit on and ridiculed. Yet she trusted in him. Just keep repeating Jesus I trust in you. What I ask you to please comfort Sage. And fold him in your love and your embrace. Give him patience as he awaits your answer and guidance. Thank you for all that he has done for your less fortunate children. Guide him, direct him and help him to do your will. Bless him always. In your name we pray.
Appreciate your Blog Sage . For me that was deep! I’m parched.
Hey Sage, I don’t know you, and I don’t believe you know me. But I want to thank you for your candid words. I quit my job 3 years ago to go into full-time ministry, and as a result, I’ve been to the desert you speak of more than I’d like. A couple of things I’ve found helpful in the desert are: 1) knowing that it’s okay to be in the desert and that others experience the same thing, and 2) receiving bits of encouragement from brothers and sisters while in the desert. Thanks for encouraging me today. May you find peace and joy in the desert by placing your trust in God and placing one foot in front of the other, and may you be refreshed by a cold drink of water soon.