OVERCOMING SPIRITUAL DISAPPOINTMENT
Over the years, I've discovered two very simple, yet powerful, antibiotics for the spiritual blues. Neither requires hours of study or days of labor. Neither will cost you a fortune—not even a single dime. Yet, when it seems as though God has abandoned you, put the two together and you will discover a formula filled with hope.
I. GOD INHABITS PRAISE
The biggest cure for spiritual disappointment is praise. When we feel God is not with us, that he's absent, that he's let us down, or when we feel our spiritual lives aren't clicking, we need the discipline of praise! Whenever I'm down, praise helps me give thanks in advance for the good that is going to come. Start thanking God for the victory ahead for you in every downer situation you're in. Praise his awe-inspiring attributes. Praise him for loving you as a Father. Thank him for his trustworthiness. Praise him for answering your prayers.
In Psalm 22, David starts with a prayer of disappointment but moves into praise:
"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring? O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not; and in the night season, and am not silent. But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel."
God inhabits praise!
II. GOD INHABITS HISTORY
The second cure for spiritual disappointment is history. Review your own history, and review the history of the people of God. Review the story of your own beginning with Christ and incidents where you were sure of his faithfulness. Then when you pray, think of Abraham, Moses, David, the story of Jesus, and the birth of the church.
I often look back on the long up-and-down history of the church and God's people, the many struggles and trials. Yet, through it all, God consistently kept his promises. When I consider such history, it propels me past feelings of hopelessness—because I begin to sense the bigger picture of God's vision.
After questioning God in Psalm 22, David starts into the history of Israel and how God has graciously watched over his people. He continues with a clear picture of Christ's death and resurrection.
There's a powerful lesson in David's formula. First, we are honest before God. Then, we remember what God has done in our lives, in the history of all his people. Then, we look forward to God's ultimate redemptive plan. When we pray like this, we may even feel like we are in a "thin place"—here our earthly lives draw nearer to heaven. God will meet us where we hurt and help us see more clearly through the fog. God always inhabits history!
At some point in all our lives, we will face spiritual disappointment. But when we are honest with ourselves and with God, when we cry out to him, when we praise him and remember his work in our lives and in the story of his people, an amazing thing happens. We stop focusing on ourselves and our own disappointments and start focusing on God . . . never forgetting the promise in Romans 8:28: "We know that for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."
(Howard Butt, http://www.thehighcalling.org/Library/ViewLibrary.asp?LibraryID=4984&WID=380&T=H&SID=12675)
How does one progress in hope?
- Reinforce the foundations, the motives the reasons. Meditate on God's power, his goodness and glorious promises.
- Effort: be on guard against presumption or despair.
- Voluntary detachment, daily renunciation, self-denial.
- Filial confidence in God: he didn't even spare his own Son (Romans 8:32-34)
- Implore the gift of final perseverance, with the help of the our Blessed Mother.
How does hope make us holy?
- On one hand, it draws us to God and on the other, detaches us from pride, power & wealth, and pleasure.
- It makes our prayer efficacious (cf Mark 2:1-12--the paralytic lowered from the roof; Matthew 9:29--the blind man of Jericho; Matthew 15:28--the Cananean woman).
- We honour God when we confide in his wisdom, goodness, power, and faithfulness.
- It is a principle of fruitful activitiy:
- It begets holy desires.
- It increases our energies.
- It infuses courage and endurance.
2 Domine, ne in furore tuo arguas me
neque in ira tua corripias me.
3 Miserere mei, Domine, quoniam infirmus sum;
sana me, Domine, quoniam conturbata sunt ossa mea.
4 Et anima mea turbata est valde,
sed tu, Domine, usquequo?
5 Convertere, Domine, eripe animam meam;
salvum me fac propter misericordiam tuam.
6 Quoniam non est in morte, qui memor sit tui;
in inferno autem quis confitebitur tibi?
7 Laboravi in gemitu meo,
lavabam per singulas noctes lectum meum;
lacrimis meis stratum meum rigabam.
8 Turbatus est a maerore oculus meus,
inveteravi inter omnes inimicos meos.
9 Discedite a me, omnes, qui operamini iniquitatem,
quoniam exaudivit Dominus vocem fletus mei.
10 Exaudivit Dominus deprecationem meam,
Dominus orationem meam suscepit.
Lord, do not condemn me in your fury:
do not destroy me in your anger.
Take pity on me, Lord, for I am sick;
heal me, Lord, for my bones are in disarray.
My spirit is deeply disturbed,
and you, Lord – how long?
Turn to me, Lord, rescue my spirit:
in your pity, save me.
If I die, how can I praise you?
Can anyone in the underworld proclaim your name?
I struggle and groan,
soak my bed with weeping night after night;
my eyes are troubled with sadness:
I grow older as my enemies watch.
Leave me, all who do evil,
for the Lord has heard my voice as I wept.
The Lord listened to my prayer,
granted me what I asked.
(Psalms 6:2-10 Neovulgate)
14 Quoniam mihi adhaesit, liberabo eum;
suscipiam eum, quoniam cognovit nomen meum.
15 Clamabit ad me, et ego exaudiam eum;
cum ipso sum in tribulatione;
eripiam eum et glorificabo eum.
16 Longitudine dierum replebo eum
et ostendam illi salutare meum.
Because he clung to me, I shall free him:
I shall lift him up because he knows my name.
He will call upon me and for my part, I will hear him:
I am with him in his time of trouble.
I shall rescue him and lead him to glory.
I shall fill him with length of days
and show him my salvation.
(Psalm 91:14-16)
24 Tollam quippe vos de gentibus
et congregabo vos de universis terris
et adducam vos in terram vestram;
25 et effundam super vos aquam mundam,
et mundabimini ab omnibus inquinamentis vestris,
et ab universis idolis vestris mundabo vos.
26 Et dabo vobis cor novum et spiritum novum ponam in medio vestri
et auferam cor lapideum de carne vestra et dabo vobis cor carneum;
27 et spiritum meum ponam in medio vestri et faciam,
ut in praeceptis meis ambuletis
et iudicia mea custodiatis et operemini.
28 Et habitabitis in terra, quam dedi patribus vestris,
et eritis mihi in populum, et ego ero vobis in Deum.
I will take you from among the Gentiles,
I will bring you together from all the earth,
I will lead you into your own land.
I will pour clean water on you,
and you will be cleansed from your filth:
from all your worship of idols I will cleanse you.
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you.
I will take the stone heart from your breast and put a heart of flesh in its place.
I will put my spirit among you,
so that you will walk in the paths of my law,
keep my judgements and obey them.
You shall live in the land I gave to your fathers.
You shall be a people for me, and I will be your God.
(Ezekiel 36:24-28)
The Gospel passage we have just heard broadens our view. It presents the history of Israel from Abraham onwards as a pilgrimage, which, with its ups and downs, its paths and detours, leads us finally to Christ. The genealogy with its light and dark figures, its successes and failures, shows us that God can write straight even on the crooked lines of our history.
God allows us our freedom, and yet in our failures he can always find new paths for his love. God does not fail. Hence this genealogy is a guarantee of God’s faithfulness; a guarantee that God does not allow us to fall, and an invitation to direct our lives ever anew towards him, to walk ever anew towards Jesus Christ.
(Benedict XVI, Homily in the Basilica of Mariazell, 8 September 2007)
Full text: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/homilies/2007/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20070908_mariazell_en.html