Struggle

Sometimes, we don’t realize what we pray for.  We stand before God and we pray for all the things that we’re supposed to pray for.  We pray for things like patience, we pray to be closer to God, we pray to love others; all the nice Sunday-School-Lesson-Stuff that we’ve been taught are the things that make a good Christian.  What we don’t realize, is that God’s path to give us all these things, usually isn’t lined with nice smelling flowers and chirping birds.  And then we’re devastated when we struggle. 

I’ve come to realize that struggle and pain are the most valuable things on earth.

A week or so ago, I was feeling good.  Like nothing could touch me kind of good.  I had my music blasting, I was happy…it was something I hadn’t felt in a while.  I also realized that I hadn’t really prayed the same way that day.  Subconsciously, I had told God, “Thanks for Your help, but I got it from here.”  I felt like I could go back to my old happy life, and take control again.  I wasn’t the girl crying and begging anymore.

The next day I was a mess.  I don’t know how or why, but I couldn’t even make it to work without breaking down. And through all of that, I’ve come to learn that I’ve never been closer to God than during times of struggle and pain.  I’ve never clung to Him the way that I have been; I’ve never been so needy and so desperate for ANYTHING He might have to say or make me feel.  And I thought, “Dear God, I need this pain.”  Instead of praying and pleading for the day when everything would be ok, I found myself kind of wishing that the struggle wouldn’t go away.  And admitting that was scary.

Do we pray for struggle?  I would say no.  Or at least, I’ve never prayed for struggle.  But I have prayed for all of the nice things in the first paragraph.  What makes us think we can have one without the other?  We will have struggle if we desire to have a worthwhile relationship with Christ.  The question is: will you ask for the struggle, or will you wait til God gives it to you…unexpectedly?  Either way, it’ll happen.  But trust me, it’s better to be prepared. 

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”