Look down from heaven and see, from your lofty throne, holy and glorious. Where are your zeal and your might? Your tenderness and compassion are withheld from us. – Isaiah 63:15

Today's Scripture Reading (October 24, 2023): Isaiah 63

Life is filled with peaks and valleys; times when everything seems to be going well, and we are on top of the world; and times when the problems seem to be winning the day, and we begin to think that the world has turned against us. And the truth of life is that we all experience both realities while on this journey together. Right now, I admit that I am going through one of the valleys. And, sometimes, it seems that God has stopped speaking. But I have come to understand that God's silence is more about me listening in the valley than God's actual silence.

Well-meaning Christians have advised me to act as if I am not in the valley. The idea is to react aspirationally as if the God who seems silent has already answered my prayer and delivered me from the valley. It is the "Power of Positive Thinking" Christianity. And I agree that living with a positive attitude has many benefits to our health and the circumstances of life. But there are also times when we must admit we are in the valley. And one of those times is when we get alone with God in our prayers.

I have also had people tell me that, when they are in the valley, it seems that their prayers are bouncing off the ceiling and falling back down on them. I have had that experience, too, yet I continue to pray. I pray in faith that God can hear me even when it seems to me that he is very far away.

That kind of praying in faith that God hears us is also the testimony of Scripture. The poets and prophets of Israel did not pray in an aspirational manner. They prayed their real situations; they prayed their tears and struggles when it seemed that only the ceiling was listening.

Isaiah prays to his God from exile. He tells God not what he wishes life was like but about his real feelings. It seems that God no longer sees the struggle that is taking place for those who are living in Babylon, far away from the land that they love. Missing from Israel is the zeal and power of God; God's tenderness and mercy also appear to be completely absent. Isaiah knows that all of Israel needs God to move.

So, the prophet sets the example for all of us. He cries out to God, revealing to the one who created him the emotions that have taken over his life. He trusts that, even now, God does hear him. And that even in the valley, God does speak. And in the end, that is all that is important. Even in my valley, I need to know that God hears my prayers. Even when I can't hear his voice, I need to trust that he answers, speaking to my hurts and frustrations.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Isaiah 64