When God lets you down

[Soverign Grace]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

 

[Pearl]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

God never lets us down. But we often feel that he has or that he isn't around anymore. At time when we feel that God has deserted us we need to tell ourselves that he has promised to never leave us or forsake us and that if we feel a distance between us a God then it is we who have moved not him. I've been there a few times and think I've learned until I face that situation all over again. Then I have to stop looking at myself and my situation and focus on him, be still and let him take hold of me again.

 

[Windmillcharge]

How do you handle it when God lets you down?

When life kicks one in the teeth, there is a choice.
To trust God or not to trust God.
It hurts, mentally, emotionaly, even physically to loose a longed for ambition.

It takes courage to continue to trust God when ones plans, hopes, ambitions have crumbled to dust and nothing is left.

Who else is there that one can trust in?

This life is not all there is, ultimaty it is whether we spend eternity with God or not that matters.

 

[Willie T]

I think all of this might better be expressed: "When we don't get our way."

 

[Prayer Warrior]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

I understand exactly how you feel, and I'm going to get very personal in order to show you this. My husband thought he could live with one foot in the world and one in Christ's kingdom. He was not faithful to our marriage vows. So many nights, I wept and cried out to God to deliver my husband. Repeatedly, God spoke these words to me: "With God, all things are possible."

Of course, I thought this meant that I would see God deliver my husband from his bondage, and our marriage would be healed and our family made whole. This was my hope, and this was God's will! But we can rebel against His will. My husband did not get right with God until a few days before his death, and I believe that God took him home (to heaven) for His own good reasons.........

However, I felt very let down by God because I had assumed God was telling me that I WOULD see my husband delivered.... Well, my husband was delivered, but our marriage was not healed, obviously. I am without a husband, and my girls are without a father. This has presented a huge hardship for us in many ways.

Even so, looking back, for the last (almost) six years of being a widow, God has been Father to my fatherless girls and my Defender!!! And He has promised me that He will restore to me the years that the locusts have eaten! I'm not going to assume what this means in practical terms, but I KNOW that He will do it because He has spoken it so many times to my heart!

The only reason that we feel let down by God is because we don't understand what He is doing in our lives. BUT HE UNDERSTANDS WHAT HE IS DOING! By faith, we have to rest in Him--in His goodness and love--especially when nothing makes sense to our minds.

I pray that you will be able to trust Him who is trustworthy and have His peace and rest!

 

[Hidden In Him]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I recall to mind all the times He has answered my prayers, so as to encourage myself He has definitely heard me, and that there must simply be something at work I don't understand that He does.

I then just leave it in His hands, and believe everything is going to be sorted out in time.

 

[CharismaticLady]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

When I face this I read Psalms 37, especially as you say, "circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times."

 

[ScottA]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

God does not "let you down."

On the contrary, He "works all things together for good, for those who love Him."

As such, it would be better to ask: "Why do I not agree with God as to what is good?" For He knows better than we do.

 

[Helen]

How do you handle it when God lets you down?

At the time..I don't handle it! I usually mulligrub.
Being human we sometimes feel like he failed us.
It usually happens when we felt He told us something which He actually did not tell us.

I have 'presumed' that He will do a certain thing..and yet He didn't.
So I pouted. Once it was for 3 months. I thought He had assured me of something...but after the three months...*I had to confess that He HAD done what I was expecting (and believed) Him to do...but because it didn't happen HOW I expected it to happen or in a way I expected, I didn't even notice it was Him!! ( until He opened my eyes and said...I did do it , and I was there , all the time"

Praise God...He is patient and loving and will wait for us to see His hand in a thing...even it isn't the way we actually expected. xx

 

[Truth]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

I think it boils down to the difference between Our Expectation's, and God's Destinations for Us!
When Crunch time come's, He Will be there!

 

[Giuliano]

Life is complicated. Other people have free will, and we can't expect God to force other people to do what we want.

 

[Butterfly]

Often we do not see or understand why God doesn't seem to be answering our prayers, but God sees a much bigger picture than us- and it is often in the future, when we look back, that we get a glimpse of what he was doing. That's my experience anyway xx
Rita

 

[Butterfly]

@Prayer Warrior - I had the same hope when I was married and had words from the Lord that my son would be used to bring him to faith, I was to focus on ' the victory '. When affairs led to my marriage ending, my dream for a united relationship was over. So I carried on ' focusing on the victory ' of seeing God work within my family and his life - now 13years later my ex is end of life, I do believe God is working within the whole situation- but I now have no idea about all the words and insights God gave me all those years ago. It does make me question, but I know one day it will make sense.
In many respects, God has brought about a United family , through reconciliation.
Rita

 

[farouk]

Often we do not see or understand why God doesn't seem to be answering our prayers, but God sees a much bigger picture than us- and it is often in the future, when we look back, that we get a glimpse of what he was doing. That's my experience anyway xx
Rita

@Butterfly Like Job, we need to grasp the big picture in trust, though it be extremely hard and incomprehensible. "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him" (Job 13.15).

(In this sense, the title of the thread is a misnomer...)

 

[farouk]

@Prayer Warrior - I had the same hope when I was married and had words from the Lord that my son would be used to bring him to faith, I was to focus on ' the victory '. When affairs led to my marriage ending, my dream for a united relationship was over. So I carried on ' focusing on the victory ' of seeing God work within my family and his life - now 13years later my ex is end of life, I do believe God is working within the whole situation- but I now have no idea about all the words and insights God gave me all those years ago. It does make me question, but I know one day it will make sense.
In many respects, God has brought about a United family , through reconciliation.
Rita

@Butterfly I can see that you say this as a result of a lot of soul searching.

"What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.” (John 13.7)

 

[Butterfly]

@Butterfly I can see that you say this as a result of a lot of soul searching.

"What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.” (John 13.7)

Yes, and that soul searching is ongoing over the matter xx

 

[farouk]

Yes, and that soul searching is ongoing over the matter xx

@Butterfly Yes, I am sure it is; and it reminds me of Isaiah's confidence, when he recorded the Lord's words in Isaiah 48.10, "I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction", that avoiding the affliction at all costs is not the real point; the real point is rather to have the firm assurance in faith - even in the midst of the affliction - that we are indeed chosen.

 

[Soverign Grace]

I understand exactly how you feel, and I'm going to get very personal in order to show you this. My husband thought he could live with one foot in the world and one in Christ's kingdom. He was not faithful to our marriage vows. So many nights, I wept and cried out to God to deliver my husband. Repeatedly, God spoke these words to me: "With God, all things are possible."

Of course, I thought this meant that I would see God deliver my husband from his bondage, and our marriage would be healed and our family made whole. This was my hope, and this was God's will! But we can rebel against His will. My husband did not get right with God until a few days before his death, and I believe that God took him home (to heaven) for His own good reasons.........

However, I felt very let down by God because I had assumed God was telling me that I WOULD see my husband delivered.... Well, my husband was delivered, but our marriage was not healed, obviously. I am without a husband, and my girls are without a father. This has presented a huge hardship for us in many ways.

Even so, looking back, for the last (almost) six years of being a widow, God has been Father to my fatherless girls and my Defender!!! And He has promised me that He will restore to me the years that the locusts have eaten! I'm not going to assume what this means in practical terms, but I KNOW that He will do it because He has spoken it so many times to my heart!

The only reason that we feel let down by God is because we don't understand what He is doing in our lives. BUT HE UNDERSTANDS WHAT HE IS DOING! By faith, we have to rest in Him--in His goodness and love--especially when nothing makes sense to our minds.

I pray that you will be able to trust Him who is trustworthy and have His peace and rest!

My heart went out to you as I read your story - thank you so much for sharing it. I too thought sure God was going to do something now I have to let that go. And it has left me with hardships as well.

You quoted one of my favorite verses that I always quote my family: "God will restore the years the locusts hath eaten."

Sometimes it's very hard to trust when you see such utter injustice and when you felt sure God was going to help you and life gets really hard. I'm seeing not to be presumptuous - The verse in James 4:15 came to mind:

14You do not even know what will happen tomorrow! What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.” 16As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil.

I hope that things work out for you. God must have His reasons for what He does - it's just hard sometimes. Very hard.

 

[Soverign Grace]

At the time..I don't handle it! I usually mulligrub.
Being human we sometimes feel like he failed us.
It usually happens when we felt He told us something which He actually did not tell us.

I have 'presumed' that He will do a certain thing..and yet He didn't.
So I pouted. Once it was for 3 months. I thought He had assured me of something...but after the three months...*I had to confess that He HAD done what I was expecting (and believed) Him to do...but because it didn't happen HOW I expected it to happen or in a way I expected, I didn't even notice it was Him!! ( until He opened my eyes and said...I did do it , and I was there , all the time"

Praise God...He is patient and loving and will wait for us to see His hand in a thing...even it isn't the way we actually expected. xx

I think I'm still in the Mulligrub stage...:/

 

[Earburner]

I know this won't be a topic many want to address yet I'm facing it right now. How do you handle it when God lets you down?

I'm trying to think that He has other plans that are better than mine yet still circumstances seem to favor unbelievers at times, and those carrying the cross have even more burdens laid on their backs. How do you handle despair with God - when you really expected help and it didn't come?

I know in Pilgrims Progress I believe it was Faith who died at the stake and then Hope walked on with Christian.

Simple answer: You and most professing Christians are living/following after a false form of faith, that your own fleshly minded is fabricating and gennerating.
If Jesus is Living within you, in the Person of the Holy Spirit (His Mind), He has brought with Him His OWN Faith, and has nothing to do with the type of faith that your human mind is conjuring up.

The Faith of Jesus (Revelation 14:12), is to simply trust in God, NO MATTER where He leads you, and/or what the circumstances are. It is one of the GIFTS OF His Holy Spirit.
1 Corinthians 12[7] But the manifestation of the Spirit IS GIVEN TO EVERY man [in Christ] to profit withal.
[8] For TO ONE IS GIVEN BY the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit;
[9] TO ANOTHER [is given] FAITH by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit;
[10] To another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues:....