Discouraged

The house is cold and it seems every board moans from the wind's pushing. Its an eerie sensation to sit at my desk, when no one else is here, and just be still. I enjoy this kind of stillness when life seems to be going well. However, on days like today, when I have yet another challenge I am facing; the stillness is overwhelmingly quiet and I feel devastatingly alone, abandoned, isolated, forgotten.

I realize that everyone on the planet is facing a challenge of one kind or another today. I'm not the only one. I remember Job, from the bible, who was afflicted with all manner of grief. I am amazed that he was able to hold on to his integrity and not curse God and die.

I feel so discouraged today, but I want to be like Job. I want to be still before God and allow Him to be enough for all of my needs. So, I prayed before I started to blog asking God to get beyond my brokenness and emotion and be enough in my life.

(I am going to digress a bit to say that I noticed in the book of Job as I was searching its pages for strength and hope; that Job "took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it". Does this mean he intentionally injured himself? Does it mean he tried to commit suicide? If anyone knows the answer to this question, please let me know. Its in Job 2:7-9.)


I'm so discouraged! I don't know what to do other than pray and ask God to help me. I recall reading in the bible one day about the heart becoming sick when there is no hope. My heart feels sick today. Its oozing and puss-filled and infected and in need of life support. I don't want to lose hope. It just seems that these hard struggles in my life have gone on and on and on. I'm weary. I want to run away to a far place and live in exile. However, this desire contradicts directly with the way God has gifted me. I naturally move towards people because I want to help them. However, I'm rarely a blessing to anyone. Good intentions are rarely enough to make a difference.

"Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior" (Hab 3:17-18).I don't feel like rejoicing. I feel like I just want to stop breathing and I certainly do not want to sit still in this old and creaking house. I could easily go out and get myself into trouble, but this isn't what God wants for my life.

I am doing what Job did when he asked God to teach him when he couldn't see. I am holding on to the faith I have and trying to get beyond the wave of overwhelming emotion that tells me I just need to do whatever I can to stop the hurt. In my mind, I know that God is always bigger than Satan's afflictions. But, my heart says it isn't true and that it just wants to cease beating. I am ready to say "when".

Alas, I know that all of these experiences are tests in my life to see if I really trust God. I do. I just don't want to feel hurt any more. I guess that contradicts me "saying" I trust God. I know that my desire to avoid further pain in my life is such a bondage. Sadly, when you experience deep hurt as a very young child, sometimes it sticks you there. Does that make sense? If you look at pain on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being where most "normal" people live and 10 being someone that has just been raped, I tend to live at a 4 or 5 most of the time. I wake up there and I go to sleep there. Like a cancer that no one can see, but that is very real nonetheless. You can imagine how quickly I can go from a 4 or 5 to a 10. I am tired of living in 10. I am exhausted of the difficult times not ending. They drag on and on and on and just when I think my time has come I feel like the rug is literally pulled out from under me and I am left bleeding on the floor. Today, I hear God telling me to get off the floor and keep moving. I think he is saying that there are people depending on me, but I just want to stay on the floor until I no longer feel my heart racing and until I am no longer able to take in another breath. I have been praying Isaiah 61 for a friend of mine for several months now. Today, it is I, myself, who is in need of Isaiah 61. The truth is I really just want to go home. God didn't create me to be a single mother. I feel incomplete without my husband. My heart feels sick. 

"He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners - to comfort all who mourn. ... a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor" (Isa 61:1-3).

I pray that God would bind up my broken heart and help me to be able to praise because right now I feel overcome by a spirit of despair. Will I ever be able to live above life's problems?