Why is this happening?
You’re probably wondering why—if God is in control—all this is happening in our world. It’s as if the whole planet has been confronted with their mortality. Our normal way of life has been restricted in numerous ways and there still isn’t clear light at the end of the tunnel. What is God doing? With Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up, many of us mourn that our holiday traditions won’t happen this year. Some of us have become extremely isolated and feel like the walls are closing in; the busyness of life has ceased and days have become long and lonely. Some have vocations that have kept you busier than usual and your trials have been of a different sort. But I think we all are experiencing this strange darkness over the earth. I want to share with you what I believe God is doing in His people during this challenging season.
Greatest life moments
I’ve been alive for a little over five decades and could list so many amazing moments. Hitting a homerun in little league, for example. Or scoring a winning goal in a soccer game. Falling in love with Tiffany in the summer of 89. The birth of our daughters. Buying our first house. Bringing home our first dog, a tiny little thing we named “Jack”. Life is filled with amazing and sweet moments. I’m grateful for every one of them.
In a category all by itself though, the greatest moments of my life, by far, have been the times when I’ve experienced the nearness of God. Theologically speaking, God is always near and, in fact, dwells within us as people of God. But I’m talking about the experience of nearness, when time seems to stand still and we are enveloped in God. These encounters with God melt away all our coldness. It’s as if for a brief moment—or several hours—the stars align and we feel in perfect union with the Creator. Communion with God seems to flow unceasingly and naturally from a spring within us that we didn’t know existed. Eternity becomes real. The love of God isn’t just an idea we know about but it is poured out into our hearts wave upon wave until we almost can’t take it. We realize the hand of God is upon us. We feel His embrace. We are washed.
Lovesick
It’s almost impossible to describe with words these experiences of nearness, but if we know Christ, we’ve all had them to varying degrees. I’ve noticed that each experience I have on the mountain of His love makes me crave Him more. As much as we’d like to remain on the mountain in the glory of His love, we always have to come back down into the valley of earthy woes. In the valley of everyday life, with its mundane routines and afflictions, we find ourselves lovesick to be pulled to the mountain to feel that glorious divine embrace. How can we not pine for this? This is why Scripture says that the true follower of Jesus longs for His appearing. Maybe you can relate to the psalmist in expressing how he feels:
As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, "Where is your God?" Psalm 42:1-3
His soul is panting for God. He doesn’t just want relief from woes or blessings from God—He is longing for God Himself. He is thirsting for God. He likens his yearning to a deer panting for water. When we are thirsty we are thinking of water every second; we are consumed. His desire is to “appear before God”. I believe that means to be embraced by God, to experience His love, to feel near. He was pining for that closeness. He was so lovesick that it was causing him to weep day and night.
What is God doing?
The questions you may be wondering in all this are: Why can we not stay on the mountain of glory? Why must we sink back into the valley? Why can’t life be all good and sweet moments? What is the purpose of the long periods of struggle in between the mountaintop experiences? And more relevant, what good purpose could there be for the Church in a global pandemic?
What God is doing with each of us is emptying out the old life and putting in the new. He is making us “fit for the Master’s use”. He wants us to be carriers of His presence. He wants us to be filled to overflowing with His Spirit. God is bringing us into a “land flowing with milk and honey”, a place of abundant fruitfulness. We are earthen vessels designed to show the surpassing power of God. We are on the anvil like metal being hammered and shaped. We are being prepared for eternity!
Here’s the thing: the Spirit cannot do all these wonderful things I mentioned in the above paragraph unless our hearts are in the right place. Let me explain.
No other way
The Holy Spirit can rest upon, and flow through in great measure, a heart that is thirsty, humble, contrite and broken. The Spirit will manifest in and through us when our hearts come to wits end over our own insufficiencies. The heart needs to be in this low posture in order to receive the outpourings of grace. There is simply no way around this. The heart must be established, fixed in a day and night poverty of spirit and longing.
This is what the valley is all about. The long periods in between mountaintop experiences of waiting in the lonely valley are essential. There’s no other way to produce that broken and contrite heart in us than to put us through the valley of affliction. Our motives are purified. We see sins we never saw before. We come to a realization of our weakness and sinfulness apart from God. Our need for God becomes palpable.
God is at work!
Be encouraged. The pandemic may feel like a “dark night of the soul” for some of you. But God is at work. He is preparing you to experience intimacy with Himself. He’s refining you and causing you to get rid of all sin and every weight that hinders. He’s leveling your pride so He can release grace. He is teaching you that you can do nothing apart from Him. He is crushing your self-life to make room for His life. He’s breaking you like a box of perfume that you might release the fragrance of Christ.
Let Him.