A throwback I wrote probably around 2007 or 08:
"I waited patiently for the LORD; he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD." Psalm 40:1-3
This verse seems to be an autobiography of my life lately. The only thing I would change to make it pertain to me even closer is that the Lord waited patiently on me rather than me waiting patiently on Him. I was in the slimy pit and He was with me the whole way through, patiently waiting for me to make my God given free will choice to let Him pull me out of the mud and mire. I was so far gone that I had a hard time praising God during worship at church. I finally got to the point where I said "No! I will not praise you any longer. You let painful things happen in my life and I feel that you are no longer worthy of my praise!" Yes I said that (and it was terribly shocking for James when I told him!). But through the whole time I knew it was a matter of my choice to come out of that attitude.
Whenever people from church asked me how I was doing, I, being the bluntly honest person that I am, told them exactly what I was feeling. What I did find shocking on my end was that none of them got the vapors or fainted or had to pick their eyeballs up off the floor. Yes, I was slightly disappointed, I love shocking people. But, instead, several different people on several different occasions said "That's alright, He can handle it." My response at the time was, "Well, good, because He's going to have to!" (Keep in mind the bad attitude I was in, I'm not always like that.) It was so amazing to have the support of those people that, instead of telling me that, oh you shouldn't feel that way, said "Lets pray." They cared about me to the extent that they could handle the hard time I was going through and even appreciated my honesty.
Satan wants us to think that we're all alone during the hard times and that we're horrible people for thinking the things we do. But when we try to ignore those feelings (as opposed to taken them captive), it usually hurts us more as time passes. That stuff has to eventually come out in some form or fashion and the longer you wait, the uglier it gets. What happened to me was that that attitude allowed the devil to have a foothold in my life. Because I opened that door, it was opened for any-ol-thang to come in. Things that I struggled with in the past came back and the longer I let it fester and build up, the more I strayed from the place that I actually really really wanted to be. The worst part was that I was deceived into thinking that I could have this attitude indefinitely and choose to come out of it whenever I wanted to and could automatically go back to the happy person I used to be. But, even now, I struggle to get back there.
There have been many times that I've heard people refer to having heard from God. I've wanted that more than anything in my Christian walk. Wouldn't that be so easy? For God to just tell me what He wants from me would be awesome. What I've learned lately is that it's not always a traditional conversation - he said she said blah blah. But God usually speaks through the "still small voice," the Bible, and through other people. God's got lots of ways to speak to us and unfortunately it's not always a "Here I am Lord" kinda situation. Well, He spoke to me in that still small voice. My revelation was that TRUTH is TRUTH. I remember hearing the words in a song at church: "Holy God Almighty." I suddenly realized "Hey, He IS Holy God Almighty - no matter what I'm feeling or believing." The fact is that veggies make us strong and healthy but children don't always believe it to be a fact. Just because we don't feel like believing something is true doesn't mean it's not true.
So, just like I choose to love James (and there are times that I don't feel like it) I also chose to praise God because I know the truth of God. I was having a spiritual conflict. I believed in my salvation and that God loves me and that He sent Jesus to die for me. But that conflicted with my feelings that I was choosing to have - that God could have prevented my pain instead of allowing or causing it. When I chose to start praising Him again on the basis of what I knew to be truth - that He is Holy God Almighty, that truth was what healed my heart. "He put a new song in my mouth" and I am able to sing to and for Him again. To say that God even allowed suffering in my life is ridiculous. God is the God of love and has no connection what-so-ever to pain or sin. He is completely separated from bad. But we live in a crappy world and unfortunately sometimes life happens. Blame it on Adam and Eve if you must, but God is not the one who deserves that blame.
I don't pretend to be "arrived" by any stretch of the imagination. But when we're at the very bottom of that infamous back slide sometimes the best place to start is with praising our Lord.
