The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.
~Psalm 34:18-19 (ESV)
We’ve all been through a season when we felt like God was silent, indifferent, detached, and deaf to our prayers. It feels like our prayers were not answered despite fervent intercession, and we just do not know how life will go on with a devastating loss and searing pain shaping every moment.
We’ve all walked that valley, and slowly put the pieces back together, licked wounds that will never completely heal this side of heaven, and gradually softened our hearts to God again. Because the Holy Spirit in us testifies that these scriptures are true – God is near us when our hearts are broken, He knows of our afflictions, and He works in ways we cannot see and often do not understand to deliver us from troubles.
Even though He may seem silent, believe His promises. God is working in the mess, He is working in the tears, even if the way He answers is different than the way we prayed. He is for us.
The garden of our faith is watered and refreshed when we feel God’s presence at work in our lives and when our prayers are answered in ways that we understand. And then there are seasons of destruction that leave us shattered and feeling that God did not hear us. But God is the same through it all, loving us, and working for our good.
As we grow in our faith, we must learn to lay our cares before God and trust Him whether we see and feel Him… or not. It turns out that there is something better and more profound than seeing God work according to what we think is right, and that is a deep trust and abiding in Him that leads us to know that He is walking beside us and will never forsake us.
If we only trust Him when we see Him working as we wish He would, we have built the foundation of our faith on shifting sand; however, if we cling tightly to our faith in the face of affliction and struggle, we have built our faith upon the rock that will not be shaken. (Matthew 7:24-27)
Know that when God seems silent, this silence is only temporary:
The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save: he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.
~Zephaniah 3:17 (ESV)
Just because we think we cannot hear God exulting doesn’t mean He is not rejoicing over us with gladness as His Word promises.
And just because we do not see a dying loved one restored to health as a result of tear-soaked prayers, it does not mean that God has not truly healed that loved one in eternity. The lost marriage, the prodigal child, the financial burden – God loves us the same and works for our good through it all.
He is near to the brokenhearted, and He saves the crushed in spirit.