Dear friend and faithful blog reader, you may feel like life has handed you more than you can bear. The discouraging situations keep piling up, and the relief you’ve prayed for seems delayed. You are tired, worn down, and maybe even wondering if God hears your prayers. Evil seems to prosper while the righteous struggle. Leaders seem confused, systems seem broken, and it feels like there is not enough power, strategy, or wisdom among people to fix the chaos. And in your honest moments, you may whisper: “Lord, what is going on?”
Discouragement is something that we all, from time-to-time, face. In fact it may be all around us. At times we are faced with challenges that seem impossible, or work that can never get finished or we have too many factors against us. It might be times of indecision, financial burdens, family conflicts or the loss of our job or chaos, pain, sickness, tiredness, violent attacks, and an increasingly large amount of evil acts, and deeds being released into the world through vicious, and planned evil attacks. It is no wonder so many people are asking, “Lord, what is going on?” Although God may not answer that question directly, if you keep praying, God will begin to bring clarity to the forefront of matters that you are inquiring about, so that you can see, hear and realize what’s going on. God is faithful, He hears, acts, and moves when you pray.
Discouraging situations will place you in times when your faith in the Lord will seem to drift away, discouraging situations can make you not feel like praying, not feel like doing anything, and not feel like giving anything or reading anything. This could be demonstrated if you find yourself losing interest in attending the worship services, or Bible classes, if you lose interest in reading God’s word, or lose interest in hearing the word of God. Yet, scriptures give us three specific examples of individuals in times of great discouragement and how they responded. Instead of falling away from God when times of discouragement came, they each one grew in faith, trust and confidence in God.
-Hannah was in deep anguish, crying bitterly as she prayed to the Lord because she was barren. (1 Samuel 1:10) Instead of giving up hope, Hannah prayed. She brought her problem honestly before God. While it may be difficult to pray when we feel so ineffective, prayer opened the way for God to work.
-In times of great difficulty, Nehemiah said “as I looked over the situation, I called together the leaders and the people and said to them, “Don’t be afraid of the enemy! Remember the Lord who is great and glorious, and fight for your friends, your families, and your homes!” (Nehemiah 4:14) Nehemiah remembered that when surrounded with threats, God is able to do wonders even in discouraging situations. That is an important lesson that we need to remember when we are discouraged.
-The apostle Paul stated, “Because of my imprisonment, many of the Christians here have gained confidence and become more bold in telling others about Christ.” (Philippians 1:14) We may not be in prison, but we still have plenty of opportunities to be discouraged. Like Paul, look for ways to demonstrate your faith even in bad situations. Whether or not the situation improves, your faith will grow stronger. People in the Bible endured much worse than YOU and with God’s help they made it through and because of this, YOU can make it through too, if you keep praying, trusting God and have faith in what He’s doing in your life right now. No one knows for sure why God allows what He does, but it is certain that God is a good God, a loving God and He cares for you and this world we live in. YOU may be surprised by what’s has happened in your life and in our world, but God is not surprised and through all that has happened, God is working in these “happenings”, to accomplish specific purposes though you may not see it.
