...return to the Lord...

“1 How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?

          How long will you hide your face from me?

2 How long must I wrestle with my thoughts

          and every day have sorrow in my heart?

          How long will my enemy triumph over me” Psalm 13:1-2?

The opening words of this Psalm 13 speak about two different possibilities in our lives. The depth of the emotions seen in the words of the Psalmist can speak of our experience of God as the source of our trouble, when we ask, “Will you, God, forget me forever?” Sometimes, do we not wonder if God will continue to forget us, and we know this feeling is directly related to our being a sinner. And here God’s silence feels like He has forgotten us because of our poor, sinful choices. Other times our experience of God’s alienation is unrelated to our being a sinner. Often God is silent, calling us to be consistently faithful and trusting that He is with us and that we have nothing to fear. In other words, there is no confession of sin, no contrition, and no recognition of personal guilt that prevents our realization of God’s blessing.

But other times, for reasons unknown to us, God has removed His mercy from us. The hiding of God’s face feels like an expression of alienation and curse, or God’s anger! And so we wonder aloud, “How long must I wrestle with my thoughts?"

Here I feel in the Psalms words that express how I feel, and I simply have no explanation for them. But both God and I must wonder together, “How long will my enemy triumph over me?”

So I feel the call to return to the Lord and spend time in prayer. I pray for mercy and for God to bring me faithful living and a desire to remain with Him forever. Join me in taking time today in silence before God. Join me in telling Him how much you love Him and need His merciful love this day. And when temptations of any kind come your way, turn to God and pray for a faithful choice this time, so that sorrow will walk away from your heart.

Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner.

From the Bible:

“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” James 5:16.

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23.

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” Romans 6:23.