Talking Tuesday: God's Absence

I think it is not news to any regular reader of this blog that things have been difficult for a long time.  On many different levels.  I find myself continually coming to the end of my strength, and still having to get up and put one foot in front of the other.  I'm exhausted on so many levels--physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually.  I'm not looking for pity, but rather just acknowledging reality, and trying to make peace with the ascesis of it.

That said, I was encouraged by this brief post from my dear friend yesterday.  In it, she writes:

"Where by God's will, by physical illness and exhaustion,

or by a season in life,

we may still be quite near to God, as in God is everywhere present,

filling all things,

but we may not sense God's presence,

we may, who were once sustained by His Presence in difficult afflictions,

later be cut off from the sense of His Presence, even when the situation gets

more difficult....

***

Met. Anthony Bloom writes of a woman 

who wrote him (she had cancer, was dying) that she was sustained

by His Presence, but later she only found God's absence

and her only prayer was not to try to create/fabricate a sense of God's

Presence when He choose to only give a sense of His absence to her."

~"Do Not Be Afraid" roosje {little rose} blog, August 8, 2016

It's not that I sense God is absent, precisely. I have plenty of personal examples of God's work in the mundane of daily life. I could tell you about finding lost things, about finding my way while lost on the road, about locating an affordable warm coat during a harsh Russian winter after weeks of finding nothing suitable for a good price. I could tell of children caught by guardian angels to avoid serious injury, of my own wakefulness in the night when a child is dangerously ill. I could tell of disasters avoided, and when they could not, of peace given in the midst of incredible storms, of the unmistakable knowledge of God's presence in a place, like a familiar scent in a room.

My friend reminded that even Christ felt abandoned on the cross, and cried out his agony. I find the events of Holy Week are never far from my mind, and I recall Psalms and passages from Job that remind me of what others have endured while following God.

Then Job answered and said:

“How long will you torment my soul,

And break me in pieces with words?

These ten times you have reproached me;

You are not ashamed that you have wronged me.[a]

And if indeed I have erred,

My error remains with me.

If indeed you exalt yourselves against me,

And plead my disgrace against me,

Know then that God has wronged me,

And has surrounded me with His net.

“If I cry out concerning wrong, I am not heard.

If I cry aloud, there is no justice.

He has fenced up my way, so that I cannot pass;

And He has set darkness in my paths.

He has stripped me of my glory,

And taken the crown from my head.

He breaks me down on every side,

And I am gone;

My hope He has uprooted like a tree.

He has also kindled His wrath against me,

And He counts me as one of His enemies.

His troops come together

And build up their road against me;

They encamp all around my tent.

“He has removed my brothers far from me,

And my acquaintances are completely estranged from me.

My relatives have failed,

And my close friends have forgotten me.

Those who dwell in my house, and my maidservants,

Count me as a stranger;

I am an alien in their sight.

I call my servant, but he gives no answer;

I beg him with my mouth.

My breath is offensive to my wife,

And I am repulsive to the children of my own body.

Even young children despise me;

I arise, and they speak against me.

All my close friends abhor me,

And those whom I love have turned against me.

My bone clings to my skin and to my flesh,

And I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.

“Have pity on me, have pity on me, O you my friends,

For the hand of God has struck me!

Why do you persecute me as God does,

And are not satisfied with my flesh?

“Oh, that my words were written!

Oh, that they were inscribed in a book!

That they were engraved on a rock

With an iron pen and lead, forever!

For I know that my Redeemer lives,

And He shall stand at last on the earth;

And after my skin is destroyed, this I know,

That in my flesh I shall see God,

Whom I shall see for myself,

And my eyes shall behold, and not another.

How my heart yearns within me! ~Job 19:1-25 [emphasis mine]

What I love about this passage is not that Job laments all that has befallen him; rather that in the end, in the middle of immense suffering, he still praises God and His goodness. I think in the cultural context of America, it can be easy to get caught up in thinking that everything *should* be easy, or pain free, that being faithful means a life of ease and comfort. I know better, honestly, but sometimes I forget, given the constant cultural pounding my brain receives. It is good to remember that times of absence are useful in shaping me in some way, and to be reminded (forcibly sometimes) that I should not expect more from life than Christ himself.

I find that strangely comforting.