Sunday, July 24, 2016

Prayers Bouncing off the Ceiling

I've heard and read often the phrase "prayers bouncing off the ceiling."  I've been there.

I remember when I was going through depression in high school, the nights lying in bed, the room dark, crying out to God but feeling like those prayers were bouncing off the ceiling.  I remember those nights feeling like God was in the next room, and I was screaming for him to help me, and it felt like he could neither hear me nor, scarier still, could he get to me.

However, the Holy Spirit filled me with the power to cling to the knowledge, the truth, that my prayers weren't bouncing off the ceiling, that God could hear me and was with me.  It was during the depression I suffered in high school that I learned that sometimes I, we have to live by what we know and not by what we feel; following our hearts is not good advice.  Sometimes our hearts lie; sometimes our hearts are stupid.

When my prayers are bouncing off the ceiling, I have to cling to the knowledge of who God is.  He is El Roi -- the God who sees us, and he is Emmanuel -- God with us.

"Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it; prone to leave the God I love.  Here's my heart, Lord, take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above."  -- "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing"

Those times when one's prayers are bouncing off the ceiling can be terrifying, but we have no need to fear.  No matter how far we wander from the path, we are his, marked with the King's seal.  We are his, safe in his hand.  2 Corinthians 1:22 (NIV) says, "Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ.  He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come."  He set his seal of ownership on us; we are under his banner; we are marked with his sigil.  In Isaiah 43:1 God says, "Fear not for I have redeemed you.  I have summoned you by name.  You are mine."

Those nights (and days) of having to cling to who God is were scary and hard, but I am his.  We are his.  He is Jehovah Nissi -- the Lord is our banner.  There is nowhere we can go that he is not with us.  He sees us in our pain and suffering as well as our happy times, and he knows, and there is no where we can go that he is not already there.

No comments:

Post a Comment