You feel like God is far away.
Is He there? Does He care? Am I all alone? Am I enough?
Below find a gift just for you:
3 Prophetic Devotions on Remembering God is Near & Beginning Again
#1: You Are Not in the Dark
“The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light” (Romans 13:12).
This is not the end, you know. Even though, this day, it may feel like it. This is the day I begin again. The day I begin again in you.
Your weariness is only temporary. Your sadness is fleeting, even though it feels like it will never end, never subside, never go away. You, my love, are sunshine. You are kisses of light upon flower petals when they stretch for light, for Me. I’m here.
I am present, my daughter. I kiss your face with my hope. I grasp hold of sorrow with a single hand and I usher it away, bit by bit. I know you want it washed away with a quick brush, a dashing movement. I could do that. But I want you to look to Me, now, child. I want you to wait on Me and recognize Me when I come for you. I want you to practice recognizing beauty and hope. I want you to wait on moments where hope feels too far away to imagine it as real. And then I want you to throw out doubt, just throw it out to the depths of hell, where sin was cast with the last breath of my Son’s words, choosing Me, seeking Me, looking to Me.
I cannot stop loving you. I cannot stop. I cannot stop chasing you, pursuing you, looking for you. Oh, girl, you are not my lost one. You are not hopeless or far from Me. I am here, and I come to hold you and lift your head to the light shining brightly on your face. Do you see it? Do you see how light comes to shine? Do you see how it came for you and how it rescued you and how light shines through all darkness so darkness, with Me close, is no more?
Do you know how all shadows are chased away with a choice to see Me? You can do this. You can see Me. You can see Me moving you, one step at a time, from this place where you feel you need rescue and I show you how I have already come and I come again. I never stop coming for you, my daughter. You are not alone, and it is not too late, and you have not done anything to chase Me away. You cannot chase Me away.
You are beloved and holy because I have made you so. You are lovely and clean because I have made you that way. You are brand new and adored and shame cannot find you. Find your name written on my hand; respond to my voice; know the name called out to you, in the light—my voice calling out when darkness feels all around but I show you I am here. In the light. Darkness isn’t around Me. And you are with Me. So darkness is not there, too.
Light all around my love. Light all around.
#2: Your Friend
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” (Revelation 3:20)
I know it feels hard to hear Me sometimes. I know you wonder how you can become more adept at listening, keen to my voice within you. My whispers are always loud enough for you to hear, but quiet enough so that they can be ignored, too.
Have you considered how this might be the best kind of relationship—a relationship where the friend doesn’t barge in, demanding to be noticed, shouting to be heard? That can be a lot of noise. And communication, then, is only clamor—not solicitude, not kindness, not fortification for your heart.
I am the friend who asks to be invited in. I am the friend in the quiet, the quiet within you, the guest outside the door knocking, waiting. I am here, not far away. And I don’t tell you I am waiting to be invited in because I want you to feel guilty or sad or discouraged. I am not telling you I stand, outside, waiting, for the purpose of making you feel you need to work harder, listen better, be a kinder daughter to Me.
I am your friend, and I love you. And I desire friends who love, who nurture, who pour kindness into one another. You can hear Me. You can be that friend, with Me.
I want you to know I am the friend who will not disappoint. I am the friend who will be strong when you need Me to be. I am the friend who will give you words of hope when you feel sad or disappointed. I am the friend who knows what you mean when you say “I am dying inside” or “I am so alone” and you are lost and afraid of the quiet.
I am the friend who can be heard, even amidst noise. Your heart can be tuned to Me, in any situation. But in the quiet, it can be easiest to hear Me. You can be busy and bustling around. But remember I am the friend who equips you to love others. And without you letting Me in, into your relationships, into your work, into your moments of doing and going and trying, you will feel hollow inside. You will feel alone.
I am the friend who knows everything about you and knows you can, indeed, hear Me.
Listen. Shall I come in?
#3: Know How You Know?
“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” (Romans 10:17)
Remember where I’ve been, my child. Remember how I’ve held you, how I’ve walked with you, how I’ve always been near. I know you struggle here. I know you wonder, “Have you? Have you been close to me, God? Have you been near? I am hurting. I don’t know the way to You. You don’t feel close. What does it mean to live with You close?”
Look deep within you first. Sit in a quiet place where you can be still, if only for a few moments. There is my word to read, the way this world began, the lives I’ve loved, the stories of adventures and glory and stumbling and pain. Stories of falling and getting up again and choosing to believe in something more than yourself for strength, for hope, for a future. And these are more than stories.
But, also, there is a listening I want to teach you, a discovery of who you are with Me, unique from everyone else. I have placed within you the map to find Me, your heart yearning for more than what you physically see. I show you beauty around you, hope and possibility in the smallest, most hidden places. But to see with my eyes, there is a listening that comes from within your heart, the place where we connect, the place where I speak to you.
Do you know how you are familiar with the voice of your closest friends? Do you know how you are so familiar you can sense their presence in a room without looking up? You know the sound of their step, their shuffle, the slide of their foot, the way the floor creaks when they pivot and stand. You know their voice, the subtle variations as they speak, revealing their mood, the expression of their heart. You know, without having to look at them, exactly their mood—if there is laughter in their eyes, or sorrow, tears beginning to spill. You know how their voice cracks when they are nervous and how their laughter starts small at first and then grows, to fill a room. You know your friends’ pasts, their stories, their pain, their glories, what has made their hearts ache, what has made them smile.
And how do you know all these things? How do you know these voices, these hearts? How are you so familiar with one another?
You have listened. You have watched. You have been vulnerable. You have spent time together. You have been present with one another when the waves have swept high and times have been difficult and long. You have been present with one another when the sun shines warm on your faces, and laughter comes fast and easy.
Come to Me, daughter. Sit with Me. Become familiar with Me. Spend time with Me. Let Me teach you the sound of my voice in you. Listen close now. Let Me show you what makes Me smile, what makes Me sad. I know you. I know you. So come be with Me. I invite you to know Me, too.
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