Walking Alone

Finding God.   L. Crabb

Not only must I consciously commit myself to purity of purpose, I must renew my commitment regularly, especially when the pain in my heart screams for relief. 
Anyone who comes to God must come as Enoch came, consciously surrendering his life to eternal purposes, fully aware that God does not always guarantee the immediate comfort of His children.

We are so often one of those people in a relationship that asks and takes a lot from others, but does not give back. We treat our Savior like that at many points in our lives. We crawl back to Him in the worst of times, run back when terrified...yet often we turn and do not pay Him attention until hard times hit again. 
I think this is more prevalent in the "younger" Christian. Not in physical age, but spiritual. At that point, it is too easy to be swayed by the daily world and lost to it. 
With time and trials, we become more dependent on God for daily life. We have found that walking on one side of a canyon, God on the other, is not pleasant. 

Sometimes during times of trouble it is nearly impossible to stick with the faith. We are bombarded, especially during those times, by evil forces. They whisper at us that God won't help us. Look, He didn't answer your prayer. Your mother still died. Your husband still left you. You didn't make the varsity team. You still are dying of cancer. You still lost a job. Look, He did not answer you. 
Oh, away evil. We must block those thoughts, cry out to God as if we are hanging on a cliff and our fingers are slipping. Those hard, horrible times cannot be handled alone. 
Look how destroyed the world is because of those things and without God. Suicides, drinking, drugs...massive clinical depression. While those things can hit us as well, we have the added ability to ask for strength from the Creator. That strength, when strongly depended on, makes these hard things easier.
When I was at my sickest with the RA, those first few months of being diagnosed, I cried out for strength to take on the pain, the nausea, the fevers. It helped so much. I could not do anything at that time---the TV ran as comfort and company, but I could not watch it most of the time. 
When we cry out, God hears us. He heard the Israelites and their struggle in Egypt...time was needed for it t be the right timing to be rescued. I cannot say why; I do not know why. I don't know why God says no, not right now, for being "rescued" from trials. I do know He does not leave us alone in them. He is more than willing to hold us as we walk ever forward toward Paradise. He will answer. Just not always in our time. There can be a great example in all of us, to show glory to God as Lazarus did by dying. Our struggles, faced full on in the Armor of God, can be great examples to others. With that Armor in place, struggles become easier, because there is not the added weight of evil, poisonous thoughts pouring from us. We simply have God, who is good beyond all measure, backing us, leading us, living in us, to stand and face the brokenness of the world. 
So cry out to God; cry out in the daytime, in the watches of the night. He will hear you, He will be near you. It may not feel like it, but how would the perfect Father not answer the cry of a beloved child. Repent of sins if they surface to your knowledge, ask for help in your walk, the unfaithfulness as the father of the sick, dying child asked for. He hears; He will not abandon you. Walk the good walk with God...and avoid being on the other side of a canyon, fighting a battle alone.