How near is God to you in your everyday walk with HIM?

[Guest LadyC]

Not close enough. Even though I am closer to Him then I have ever been, I want to be even closer, so my walk will never be close enough. Don't get me wrong, He has blessed me over and over, protecting me for the fiery darts of the devil and shown me more grace and love then I will ever know, but there still is a yearning to be even closer! I'll never be satisfied until I am with Him.

you took the words right out of my mouth. lately i've felt distracted from God, even though i'm closer to Him than at any other point in my life. i've felt distracted every morning the last week or so when i spend time praying and reading the word. i know that i'm being tested right now... satan is trying to steal my joy. but i just keep telling God that HE ALONE is the source of my joy and strength, and this morning i played hooky from church so that i could really focus directly on Him.

that sounds kinda backwards, huh? but it's exactly what i did, and for the first time in probably two weeks, i was undistracted. i read well beyond what i usually read, and feel more at peace with circumstances today than i've felt since those fiery darts started landing all around me.

[Honeybee88]

I have to admit, God feels distant right now. He isn't, but it's hard when you have to walk by faith, without any of the feelings that make your faith pleasant, shall I say? It reminds me of a passage in one of my favorite books, Stepping Heavenward;

In my prayers my mind has difficulty in finding anything to

say to God. My heart is not in it, or it is inaccessible to the

thoughts of my mind.

"REPLY.-It is not necessary to say much to God. Oftentimes one does

not speak much to a friend whom one is delighted to see; one looks at

him with pleasure; one speaks certain short words to him which are

mere expressions of feeling. The mind has no part in them, or next to

none; one keeps repeating the same words. It is not so much a variety

of thoughts that one seeks in intercourse with a friend, as a certain

repose and correspondence of heart. It is thus we are with God, who

does not disdain to be our tenderest, most cordial,-most familiar,

most intimate friend. A word, a sigh, a sentiment, says all to God;

it is not always necessary to have transports of sensible tenderness;

a will all naked and dry, without life, without vivacity, without

pleasure, is often purest in the sight of God. In fine, it is

necessary to content one's self with giving to Him what He gives it

to give, a fervent heart when it is fervent, a heart firm and

faithful in its aridity, when He deprives it of sensible fervor. It

does not always depend on you to feel; but it is necessary to wish to

feel. Leave it to God to choose to make you feel sometimes, in order

to sustain your weakness and infancy in Christian life; sometimes

weaning you from that sweet and consoling sentiment which is the milk

of babes, in order to humble you, to make you grow, and to make you

robust in the violent exercise of faith, by causing you to sweat the

bread of the strong in the sweat of your brow. Would you only love

God according as He will make you take pleasure in loving Him? You

would be loving your own tenderness and feeling, fancying that you

were loving God. Even while receiving sensible gifts, prepare

yourself by pure faith for the time when you might be deprived of

them and you will suddenly succumb if you had only relied on such

support.

So writes Fenelon to an enquirer, and it comforts me to not be discouraged if this be my state.