Have you ever noticed that sometimes the more you search for something, the further away it gets?
Sometimes, with the best of intentions, we go to God looking for answers… for direction… for guidance… and we get…
nothing.
We get silence. We can be quiet. We can listen. We can be silent while screaming inside at the top of our lungs, “WHERE ARE YOU?!?!?!”
We’ve done all we are supposed to do. We followed all the rules…prayed, sat in silence and yet we get… nothing. We can’t find Him.
I have started wondering if I am trying too hard. If I should stop looking. And start acknowledging.

I begin thinking God has gone somewhere. That He has fallen silent and I am doing something wrong. I need to search for Him and find Him. But really, I don’t think either of those things are usually true. I think I am just waiting for Him on my terms instead of His. I want the control. I want answers, direction, resolution. I want the warm and fuzzy feeling that I think faith should provide me. I have grown up to believe, and think that if I just follow the rules of praying that I will get the answers in my time and in my way. I long to know what He knows, and I wait to hear the definitive word so I can step forward in His good grace. And when He is silent, I think I’ve missed something. And I once again think I need to find Him. Do you notice the control theme in there? I want. I look. I expect. The other day, I had one of those “Aha” moments when I was driving home. It was an overwhelming day, there wasn’t one thing that seemed to go right. I was tired of the numerous things that seemed to not be going how I wanted them to and in the middle of these thoughts, I began taking in the warm sun and the green grass when my thoughts went to, “My God, you made the most beautiful day.” And then I thought I had gone crazy. How could I be so frustrated… feeling He was nowhere near me and silent… and have that one thought turn me on a dime. And it was then I realized:
I don’t need to find God. I just need to acknowledge Him. I thought He was silent because He wasn’t giving me the answers I was looking for. He wasn’t speaking to what I wanted Him to speak to. I was putting in my quarters and He wasn’t being the vending machine I had come to expect Him to be. I knew what I needed and what I wanted and He wasn’t providing. He wasn’t under my control. But He hadn’t gone anywhere. I was the one who had moved. I moved from a place of being a servant to a place of wanting Him to serve me on my time and in my way. In that moment I stopped trying to find Him… find the creator of the Universe who I thought had somehow disappeared, because he was EVERYWHERE. I was just looking for what I wanted instead of what He was offering. I stopped looking for Him and started acknowledging Him. I stopped waiting for my answers and started walking forward in faith. Instead of waiting for Him to give me what I needed ahead of time, I started trusting that He would give me what I needed when I needed it. I didn’t pack my bag before the trip… I started walking down the road and trusted that He would provide as I went along. I just needed to keep acknowledging Him along the path. I acknowledged that He didn’t have to speak to be heard. I needed to start listening with something other than my ears. I needed to let go of the idea that walking in step with God meant that I would always feel good and content in my decisions. That I would hear what needed to be done before I took the first step to make it happen. I acknowledged that walking in faith is hard and scary, and that’s ok. Because hard and scary is His specialty. I just have to trust Him. With love and joy,
Laura Pedersen
Comments