clouded eyes and murky heart

I do love God. I don’t want anyone to think that I don’t. I was talking with my friend Mandy, who read my last blog post, and I confessed, “I have such a difficult time trusting God. I used to trust God with my whole being, but then I went through great loss and great pain, and it really shook and rattled my trust in God, as well as my perception of Him. For a time I grew cold towards God, untrusting due to the conviction that to trust God is to be disappointed and hurt, and I began to perceive God as a sort of cosmic sadist. I hated God—no, not God, but the ‘God’ I had created in my own mind. My skewed perception of God has been chipped away and replaced with something more majestic and awing and powerful than before, but the hesitancy to trust Him still remains, and it is something I fight every day.” That is part of our conversation, embellished a bit.

 

I told Mandy, “I’m like the Apostle Peter—I often deny God with my choices.” It is sad but true. The gospel narratives show disciples who were stupid and foolish and disobedient; they are testaments to the nature of man. I am stupid quite often. Foolishness runs through my arteries like sap in the veins of a tree. My disobedience is set vibrantly against my feeble and often failing in submission to God’s ways. I don’t want to be stupid, or foolish, or disobedient. I want my life to be radically changed, radically altered. I want, once again, to pursue obedience as if it were gold, to find joy in the higher wisdoms of God, to be foolish in the eyes of the world rather than in the eyes of God. I want to be the man of Psalm 1, who is obedient and prosperous in joy and peace. But this feels so far off. It feels nearly untouchable.

 

I want to trust God again. I want my life to again be characterized by His love, grace, and mercy. I want to find the higher joy, the higher comfort, the higher peace. I want to have contentment with my lot, not all this regret which I swim in day-after-day. I feel as if I am at a crossroads: I can either continue in my regret, continue in my stress, continue in my sorrow and sadness; or I can stand, and I can strive into the realm of peace and joy and contentment. But this crossroads is draped in a heavy blanket of fog, and I am not sure which way is which, nor where to direct my steps when I choose a path to walk. I know which direction I want to go, but I don’t know how to get there—and, honestly, I don’t even know how to lift my legs. My eyes are clouded, and my heart is murky.