Feb 21st, 2021: Listening and Be Comforted

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I have done enough pastoral care for marriages that are in trouble to know that the first statement from either side tends to be: "We don't talk anymore. We live like two strangers under the same roof." Communication is the lifeline in human relationships. Most of us know that, and yet many of us have failed to be good communicators.


The same principle will work with our relationships with God. The dryness of our prayer life is the main reason that we cannot hear God at all? We are so preoccupied with our affairs, and we pray as if we need someone to rubber-stamp our plan for life. So what happens to us when we experience the desert in our prayer life?


We fail to understand God because we don't care about what God has to say. We can't see God if we ignore His revelation. Much of God's revelation occurs in our prayer time. When we pray for others, God might ask us to be with them fully. When we do that, we yield to God's voice more often.


We might overlook opportunities to serve Him. We won't see if we don't ask. We won't receive if we live our lives as if God is not in the picture of our daily affairs. Seeing God is having the willingness to suffer with others.


We live with an increasing internal conflict. We discover our selfishness when we live in silence. We will hear some other voices, and none of them is God's. These voices will tempt us to betray our relationships with God. The internal conflict won't end.


We don't trust other people. How can we when we don't even trust ourselves? We tend to fill in the empty gap of communication and become even more distant from others.


We feel alone in our brokenness and cannot run away from it. We can smoke, drink and do drugs. We might try to escape the voice of God's love. We run towards the tunnel of darkness when we know that there is no way out. We try to keep busy only to discover that the tidal wave of confusion is about to swallow us. Suddenly the silence of the night is unpleasant.


Have a good time with God on this day.


Isaiah 41: 10

"Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

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