Have you ever experienced a point in life where every piece of your life is being challenged-your marriage, your job, your finances, your health, etc. I have been there. I have suffered many sleepless nights-nights full of worry about my health and wondering if I will ever be healthy again. Nights where I laid awake worrying about how we will come up with enough money to pay our bills for that month. I have worried about my kids well-being and raising them in a world that is tainted and sinful and harsh. I could go on and on and on. What do we do when we get to this place?-where our world feels like there isn’t one part of it that hasn’t been hit hard and wrecked.

With every bit of suffering that I go through, I am learning more and more about how suffering and trials bring me closer to my Heavenly Father. But that closeness only happens when I am willing to go to Him and bring my worries, my sleeplessness, my overloaded and overwhelmed self before the throne of God. Once I’m willing to lay it all at his feet, this is when I can feel peace and rest.  This is when I can recognize and experience God’s peace. 

“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

‭‭Philippians‬ ‭4:4-7‬ ‭ESV‬‬

In the Psalms, we see David pouring his heart out to God over and over again. I admire David-he brings it all to God-anger, joy, praise, confusion, sadness. He brings all of these emotions to the God of the Universe.  God already knows what we are experiencing and feeling. So why do we hide from God? Why do we do everything else before bringing our restless, anxious hearts before the throne of God? I’m not sure other than maybe we don’t want to bother him with our problems. Maybe we feel that our problems are too small for God and that he has bigger issues to deal with. Maybe we think that we can handle life on our own and that eventually we will figure things out. All of these conclusions couldn’t be further from the truth! Our God, our Father, He wants to hear from us. The closeness that we can experience with God when we are authentic with Him is like nothing we’ve ever experienced before.

My prayer for you, reading this today, is that you do not convince yourself that God doesn’t want to hear from you. I pray that you are willing, today, in this moment, to bring it all to Him-the good and the bad, the praises and the sorrows. He wants to hear from us!  God loves each of us so much! (You included)

In fact He loves us so much that He was willing to send his one and only Son, Jesus, to die a criminals death on the cross so that we could be saved, have a personal intimate relationship with God and spend eternity in heaven with Him! If that doesn’t show us how much He loves us, I don’t know what does!

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

‭‭John‬ ‭3:16‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Take a few minutes to listen to this song and I encourage you to come before God in this moment just the way you are!