“Lord,
God of my salvation,
I cry out before You day and night.
-I haven't exactly cried out to God day and night but I sort of gave up and let myself be distracted by YouTube (namely the tonight show with jimmy Fallon) yet I felt the cry in me being reigned in. I felt myself too tired to let it out. Too lazy. I didn't want to cry because I chose not to search for Him for comfort. God seemed to be failing me the last few days in the area of comfort and so I stopped going to Him. It was as if He was broken or His line was always busy. Jimmy Fallon made me laugh, at least, and that was some comfort....though never satisfying enough.-
May my prayer reach Your presence;
listen to my cry.
-so I set aside the feelings and the discouragement and I am praying now. I am crying now, and I hope God...I want You to hear me and see me crying.-
For I have had enough troubles,
and my life is near Sheol.
-wave after wave of instances that bring me down have caused me to feel hopeless. My life feels more apt to be put down than to continue. I can't seem to find an area that isn't troubled, and because of that it seems too overwhelming. Too heavy. I'm about to be crushed under the weight of everything I can't do, need, or want but don't have. There is nothing of me to live on and therefore death feels imminent.-
I am counted among those going down to the Pit.
-it looks and feels as if I walk a downward spiral. This pit gets deeper, darker, and lonelier.-
I am like a man without strength,
abandoned among the dead.
-I can hardly get up to even walk my dog or go to the gym, which usually makes me feel great. I usually love to work out, but now I just sit or lie down like a zombie. I am unwilling to move much because I am unable to find moving worth the effort. I have no energy, no vitality, no joy.-
I am like the slain lying in the grave,
whom You no longer remember,
and who are cut off from Your care.
-the worst part about all of this is that I feel unloved and uncared for. I am physically drained from the things I usually feel: joy, confidence, courage, love, peace, and awe. I mean physically because my body aches and nothing is done for it which in turn means no care is given me, and so I am lying like a lost wounded person in the middle of a brushfire, in pain but without any notice. God, I know sees me, and the pain is doubled when I know You see me yet nothing is being done to help me. You leave me here, wounded and burning, as if You forgot who I am. That's the worst part. To feel like You don't love me, even though I know You do, it feels so much as if You stopped.-
You have put me in the lowest part
of the Pit,
in the darkest places, in the depths.
-You put me here. You know me and You don't forget anything, so You put me here in the brushfire where I'm wounded for a long time without care or help. I sank with my abused heart into the grimy mud, without shelter when it rained or a blanket when it was freezing, and my sores were open. My body and mind hated me, and none was where I was, in the darkness. No one saw my wounds and tended to them, and I refused to move even if I could to find help because I was more angry that You put me here. You did this. If You let me suffer then no one would be able to help me. It is Your hand that pressed me down and would not let me get up.-
Your wrath weighs heavily on me;
You have overwhelmed me with all Your waves. Selah
-You had every right to be angry with me. I was angry with me. I knew You should be angry with me, yet I wanted grace instead of this. I wanted mercy instead of pain. I wanted You to pour Your unconditional love that makes me filled with hope and joy rather than to be placed in darkness. Wave after wave weakened my resolve, and I lay there underneath Your anger which made me angry too. How could You do this? Why would You do this when You know me so well, how wicked I am and needy and weak. I could not stand and I depended on You to make me walk, but You left me on the ground in my condition. Without the feeling of Your love I feel Your wrath. And it weighs heavy on my soul so that I cannot move.-
You have distanced my friends from me; You have made me repulsive to them.
-I can't seek community or solace from my friends because You won't let me. I'm only the mean selfish person without Your love, and since I cannot feel loved I emanate my own wickedness towards others, and they don't want to be around me. I don't want to be around me.-
I am shut in and cannot go out.
-I cannot escape. You have me here, and there is no way out. No scripture, no exercise, no prayer, no blogging, no fellowship will pull me from this place, because You have shut me in.-
My eyes are worn out from crying.
Lord, I cry out to You all day long;
I spread out my hands to You.
-I spread my hands out but in a weak manner. I go to You in my heart and speak to You from my thoughts, but I am unanswered. So I sit open handed in a way that easily puts me to sleep. There is hardly any intention left. Just a motion. I'm barely even here.-
Do You work wonders for the dead?
Do departed spirits rise up to praise You?
Selah
-I'm like a ghost. I'm vapor, and I am fading away. What happens from here? Do things happen here in this place? Clearly You put me here, so perhaps being wounded and then dead might have a purpose.-
Will Your faithful love be declared in the grave,
Your faithfulness in Abaddon?
Will Your wonders be known in the darkness
or Your righteousness in the land of oblivion?
-how does it work here? In oblivion. If my mind and my body are dead and there is no light of life left in me, what part of You is to be experienced? Will I still find Your love, Your faithfulness, Your wonders, Your righteousness here? How could I know these things if I cannot see or articulate them. How does that even work? I can't. Without a mind or a body to grasp You, I cannot have Your presence with me the way I want. So what then. I am just deadness in the land of the forgotten.-
But I call to You for help, Lord;
in the morning my prayer meets You.
-Still, I have a mind enough to know I still need You. Despite the lack of goodness and joy, I taste depravity more. My hunger becomes specific. My eyes stop searching, and they close. My body stops moving, and I am with only one single desire. I search for You. I ask for Your help. I keep going to You.-
Lord, why do You reject me?
Why do You hide Your face from me?
-It is a terrible thing to be without You. Yet, You have placed me in oblivion to Your felt presence. I don't understand why it had to be this way. I know You make me more hungry and more thirsty for Your living waters in these moments, but I also feel mistreated by You. I feel abused in my heart, and abandoned.-
From my youth, I have been afflicted
and near death. I suffer Your horrors;
I am desperate.
-For a long time I have felt myself to always be so needy because of the way my life has been from birth. I always needed help, I always needed to be protected, cared for, corrected, and shown the better way. I always got it wrong, or messed things up, and I suffered for it. You knew all along that I would do those things, and the more I saw Your truth about the matters the more I suffered my inadequacy. Your ways horrified my lifestyle and my inclinations. I became desperately limbless and in utter need of You for every single minute thing.-
Your wrath sweeps over me;
Your terrors destroy me.
-All of Your corrections pounded me like fine dust. Those heavy blows crushed me into powder. My limbs were all broken and bruised so that I could not do anything. If I wanted to do something or accomplish something I was terrified by Your standards. I couldn't make up my mind because either direction I was wrong.-
They surround me like water all day long; they close in on me from every side.
-You hemmed me in my wounded mess. You saw my heart lay bare and the floods of my tears would not stop overwhelming me. I could cry and that was all I could do. All I could do was cry and cry and cry and then drink water to cry more. Crying was all I could do. I cried and You kept me there.-
You have distanced loved one and neighbor from me; darkness is my only friend.”
-Despite all the joys I've had from loving others and being loved by them, there were more nights where I was alone. Darkness was my only friend. Yet, it did not feel like one. I hated it. But I could not escape it. And in that sense it was my only companion. Darkness kept me company and would not leave me. Darkness stayed with me and You allowed it to stay with me too. I was always at Your will's command.
My prayer was for You to tie me to the alter and remove what was death in me, but I never expected that it would be like this.
-Psalms 88:1-18
“Teach us to number our days carefully
so that we may develop wisdom in our hearts.”
Psalms 90:12
“Jesus replied, “This is the work of God — that you believe in the One He has sent.””
John 6:29
I have very little to say now, because all of what I wrote was what was in my heart. I drained each thought like a cup poured and emptied of its contents. I pray to be filled anew with wisdom and belief.
Jmegrey
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