The Lord Cares

I've been under quite a bit of strain recently. I had been carrying a burden on my heart for quite a while. Some time early this month, I reached a direction on where my feelings stood.
Then came a blow. One of our church members, a very beloved lady passed away on Saturday night. I was affected in the sense that I was preaching the very next day. That night was the first of many sleepless nights. After seeing the family, home, I reached home myself at 12 midnight, completely unaware of what was about to happen.
I woke up at 3.30 am and couldn't go back to sleep. I felt very heavily burdened. I was filled with a feeling of dread. My parents came in to give 'ang pows' (they normally do this on the eve of CNY when my sister and I are sleeping) and they were wondering why I was awake, Anyway, after they left, I sneaked out to the living room and there I wrestled in prayer. I begged God to take the burden away from me or let me sleep. No dice.
I wrestled until about 5 am and then decided that I was better off heading to church anyway. So I took a bath (I don't normally do that in the mornings because it was so cold) and headed off, the earliest I have ever been to church in my life.
The preaching went OK, according to friends. I was not so sure. I realised that I would suffer spiritual attacks (as if things weren't bad enough then) after I step off the pulpit. I would feel tremendously worthless and have said things that were totally useless to anybody in particular.
Thankfully that night, I rested well. Maybe it was because I was so tired by then. But just when I thought it was over, I was hit again on Monday night. This time, it was real bad. I couldn't sleep until 2.30 am. I said to God, 'Lord, I really can't do this. Please let me rest. I really can't take it.' I did go to bed.
And woke up again at 4 am. I begged and implored God to help me because I believed even sleep was a gift from Him. I didn't know why He didn't answer this prayer. But He wanted to tell me something. The same thing happened again on Tuesday.
I think the strain actually showed on my face when I went to work on Wednesday. A colleague saw and took me aside to encourage me. That helped a great deal but I found myself having another fruitless night struggling.
By that Friday during my church's prayer meeting, I was ready to just give up. I felt that I could give up and let some things just die. I thought, all right, I've got that out of the way now I can sleep.
It was not to be. I was really confused and lost. I could understand if it was God's will for nature to take its course in another way from what I expected (or hoped) and I was stubbornly holding on. I didn't understand because I had already made the decision to give up. So by right, I should be at peace, right?
Well, apparently not. At least, God sent people who love me to help cushion the blow. Now, I'm waiting for God to reveal His purpose for all this. All this happened around the time of my birthday so I'm somewhat dubious about how this can be a happy birthday.
On my birthday, I had to attend a Induction Service for a Vicar of another church. As I sat there, I felt overwhelmed because I knew that was the path I would one day take and I was very, very frightened. I felt I couldn't do it. But that was all right for that day. That evening, my mentor (who also happened to be my boss)and his family were kind to bring me to Swensen's for a treat. I shared with him how intimidated I was. Basically I felt the weight of my calling.
The next day it really hit me hard. I was the worship leader and I almost couldn't do it. I was locked in trepidation. I wasn't sure how I got through but God eventually gave me strength to overcome it.
I realised that when I fought a battle, it was because God gave me what was needed to make it though. But it was always enough to make it through this battle, never to win the whole war. I think this is good because I would otherwise never have known to constantly depend on Him. I would never have grasped the full implications of 'His mercies are new every morning'.
Of course, the other lesson is, faith is never the absence of doubts. It's about struggling with your doubts. Sometimes, you end up carrying them all the way until God fulfils His promise to you. I suspect Abraham had to wrestle with moments of despair while waiting for Isaac. I don't think he spent a good part of his life not thinking about whether God had forgotten him. He has had to grapple with whether he had heard God right. Maybe he should just give up and move on. God can't have been wrong so it's more likely he misread God. He surrenders but still gets torn in doubt.
Yet there are also times where he feels irrefutably sure that he has heard God correctly. Sometimes it is God who reassures. How He does this, not necessarily through appearing but in the quiet contemplation of the heart. As he sat still and quietened his heart, the Lord gives him a peace that He knows what He is doing. He believes not because he has the evidence but somehow he refuses to give up hope despite the doubts gnawing at him. By the time that God actually appears to him to reaffirm His promise, Abraham is ready to believe.
Interestingly the Bible states that Abraham believed the word of God and it is recorded that 'it was credited to him as righteousness' (Genesis 15:6). It is good news for us because what matters is that at the point when God tell us something, do we believe? When we do, it is inevitable that doubts will assail us. They are part and parcel of God shaping us, not an indication of lack of faith. It is not significant whether we suffer doubts or can find the reserve to believe completely without having doubts; the heart of the matter is whether we believe that God will do whatever He said He would do. Doubts and uncertainty are part of the package.
So if you living in uncertainty about the future direction, trust the Lord. If He leads you in a different direction from the one you expected or hoped for, so be it but when you hit setbacks and doubts, don't immediately assume you were wrong. Stop and wait on the Lord first and let Him speak to you in that still, small voice.