Have you ever been so perplexed, depressed, frustrated that you can’t even stand to see your negative thoughts put down on paper?

So many thoughts have been swirling in my brain this month as I adjust to a new place and to often perplexing and sometimes unpleasant circumstances. And though writing has typically helped me in the past to plunk those difficult musings on paper as something tangible and therapeutic, lately scribbling anything about my pain and sorrow—even in a journal no one will read—has been something I have been avoiding at all costs.

Why is that? Why do I want to escape from my thoughts? Why do I run away from the pain? Why is it so hard sometimes to face the dross I see God pulling out of me?

Before I came to this season of wilderness, I was excited about change, excited about new, excited about great things God was going to do in and through me. But that was before the realization that change meant I would have to change—not my circumstances, not frustrating people around me, like the slow driver ahead or the thoughtless person in line at the grocery store. No, it meant I would have to change.

I was excited until I realized new meant I would have to endure discomfort, watch my weaknesses bubble to the surface, and listen as my often negative thoughts got the better of me and others around me.

After such a positive and brave and courageous push to get to this new season with Holy-Spirit driven encouragement from a slew of God-centered friends to help me not to faint in the process, it made no sense to me why it seemed like God wasn’t meeting me on the other side.

Practically once I stepped over the threshhold and arrived in a new place, it felt like all hell had broken loose and Jesus was sleeping in my boat. Where were the cheers for having made a difficult initial journey? Where were the rhema words from the lips of God? Why was I experiencing the most fearful panic attacks of probably my entire life? Why was my heart breaking in two over this move? Where was God’s power to combat the devil’s schemes?

It made no sense to me then. But it is starting to now.

No, I don’t have it all together. I can’t say I have gone through my trial and come out on the other side more blessed than stressed. I would say that I am still leaning toward the stressed side of things. I am still in the fiery furnace. I am walking out my trial by fire even as I write this.

But I do believe that God has a plan. And that is biblical, since I can clearly point to Jeremiah 29:11 for a hope-filled account of what God has in store for me, as well as you.

I don’t get why that plan currently must come with pain, but I daresay Jesus didn’t get that either before heading to the Cross. Otherwise, why would He have hesitated briefly in the Garden of Gethsemane with this quick thought toward Heaven, “If You could take this cup away from me…”. Suffering without purpose is simply pointless. Pain with no hope beyond is really death—maybe not physically speaking, but certainly emotionally speaking.

I have been thinking a lot about Jesus and His own desert experience, when the Holy Spirit ushered the Son of Man into the wilderness to be buffeted by Satan before He started His earthly ministry. That was 40 days of hardship. He was alone, thirsty, hungry, and being accused and harassed in His mind, His will, and His emotions. No friends were there to lessen the pain or encourage our Lord. It was Him and God and a relentless devil. He was a prime target for a sly devil.

The difference between the way He handled His desert experience and the way we typically deal with ours, if I can use myself as an example on the human end, is that Jesus spoke life and truth over His uncomfortable and harassing circumstances, whereas we have the tendency to grumble, complain, cry, get angry, accuse God, and lay down and die in some dramatic, Jonah-like display of martyrdom. And, frankly, none of that stuff works.

The Bible tells us to submit to God first. Then we need to resist the devil, and when we resist the devil, he will flee from us.

It’s not enough to try to fight the devil if you don’t trust God. If you don’t believe God is good, if you don’t believe God is for you, if you don’t believe God is stronger and that He hasn’t left you or forsaken you, then you can’t stand against Satan when he attacks. That’s the flat-out truth.

You can scream till you are bright red. You can quote Scriptures up and down while standing on your head. It won’t do a bit of good. Distrust, lack of faith, doubt—these will all rule you and me, unless we run back to the God who we may have originally felt betrayed us because He didn’t do life the way we expected or wanted.

If you are tracking with me on this, I suggest you do what I have been doing lately: repenting majorly. We have to repent of our anger and bitterness toward God. We simply got it all wrong. God is not the enemy, friends. Let me say that again: God is not the bad guy in this equation. He is the answer to every situation, every trial, every hurt, every plea for help that escapes our lips. So, humble yourselves and submit yourselves once again to God. Decide to trust Him again, even when there still isn’t money in the bank, the illness hasn’t gone away, the children are still being rebellious, and you don’t “feel” any closer to God. In fact, trust Him even when your prayers seem to lead to the reverse of what you prayed.

It’s one of Satan’s tactics. I can pretty much guarantee it. We pray big, faith-filled prayers, and instead of getting our miracle, we get a bigger mess than we had before we prayed. Does this sound familiar? For me it does. The whole point in this supposed reversal of fortune is to get us to stop praying, stop believing, and quit.

If we focus too much on our problem, that wind and those waves angrily swirling around us, and not enough on the very present and very powerful God that we serve, we can quickly conclude that God didn’t answer us. We think God didn’t show up. Sometimes we can even wrongly think that the devil is stronger, so why try anymore.

But the Bible says that what Satan tries to use for our distress, God will use for our good. In Him, distress becomes deliverance. Evil becomes good. Why? Because God is good and He knows just how to orchestrate everything—even the yucky stuff—to grow our character and make us shine despite the shadows we have been walking in.

And I say a hearty amen to that!

You with me? Let’s take a minute and talk to God about all this.

God, thanks for growing us up in You. It isn’t fun. A lot of times, change and growth are painful. We don’t understand what you are doing and why. We want to stay comfortable. Yet you call us onward to be more and more like you. Help us not to chafe under your molding power. Help us to stay calm even while we are in the crucible, being refined. Encourage our hearts by Your presence so that we don’t lose heart. Give us a revelation of Your love and of Your truth. Help us to stay fastened to You, to continually submit to your process while we are going to the desert, knowing that when the time is right, we will emerge purified, full of Your glory.

In the name of Jesus Christ we pray,

Amen.

— Laura J. Bagby

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