. . .today, came a spontaneous devotional. Who knows, maybe I will be more spontaneous in the future!
I usually don’t get super spiritual in my Love Inspired Suspense books. I write with a Christian worldview, sure, and sometimes the characters’ spiritual struggles are palpable, other times not so much. But in this story (the second Mountain Cove book), I could feel my character, Heidi, crying out to God. And maybe. . . just maybe that was ME crying out to God.
Crying out to God from the deepest part of your heart is good. He wants that.
And maybe you feel this way sometimes too.
Here’s an excerpt from my very much rough and unedited work in progress:
This was a nightmare, and she prayed to God if she lived through it she wouldn’t continue to dream about these people who forced them to assist them through the mountains like this.
She’d only thought she’d been depressed before. Oh Lord, please give us hope. Help us out of this somehow. Use us to show these people your love and grace. Just. . .show up.
The prayer lifted from her heart, but she’d never felt so alone. God was there. She knew He was, but why couldn’t she feel Him? Get a sense of His presence?
What about all those verses in Palms 139? She’d meditated on them, used them to help her get through, and yet here she was hiking through the wilderness and slipping back into the darkness.
She whispered to herself, “‘If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me, even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.’”
Where are you God?
Can you feel her gnawing pain? Her spiritual emptiness? And yet she’s hungry for God. The Word says He is close to those with a contrite heart.
The righteous cry, and the LORD hears And delivers them out of all their troubles. The LORD is near to the brokenhearted, And saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34: 17-18
For now, I’ll rest in that.
Blessings!
Elizabeth
