Read Psalm 42
The other day during my small group I noticed that one of the guys was abnormally quiet. I can tell something was bugging him but out of respect for him I didn’t say anything in front of the group. I was more passive, I just sat back and watched and observed and then after the group I was able to pull him aside and ask him what was wrong. We were able to work through some things and we got it worked out.
I feel God works in this way sometimes. God works passively. There are times in which we feel that we are not as “on fire” as we used to be. Where we go through these dry spells of feeling confident in God, where we don’t feel His presence and our passion is not there anymore. We can call it a “spiritual winter.”
This is when a person looses all of the pleasure they once had in pursuing their devotional life. It happens to all of us. For me, it was the period in which I was searching for a new church to attend at the same time I was trying to finish up college. There was no passion or desire to dive deeper into the Word. I used to be the fired up, ready to do anything for ministry guy and I turned into the questioning, ministry is draining, God and I were not close right now. God was distant. But He is far from distant.
He is being passive. Watching us, observing us because it is during these times in which God wants to purify us and move us onto greater heights. When we first are a believer we are excited, the soul is cared for by the spirit and all is good. But then it comes for a time in which God bids us to grow deeper in Him. So he will strip all the excitement and pleasure we once had in Him in order for us to go actively seek Him and grow deeper in our passion for Him.
He becomes passive so that we may become active.
God knows our imperfections. Because of His love for us He wants us to grow. This love prevents us from staying in our weakness and this is the reason in which He places us in “spiritual winters”. He slowly pulls us away from the pleasures we have acquired in Him by giving us dry times and inward darkness.
No person will ever grow deep in their spiritual life unless God works passively in them through their “spiritual winters”.
So when we feel like we are in a dry spell and we feel that God is no longer working in us because our passion and pleasure is not there anymore, God is not far at all. He is actually working within you at that moment. He is working passively so that you can be more active in seeking Him and growing deeper in Him.
So keep seeking.
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