The Upper Room 4th January 2022 Daily Devotional | Tuesday Message
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Holding on to God
Ted Witham (Western Australia, Australia)
TODAY’S READING
Job 1:13-22
KEY VERSE: In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing. – Job 1:22 (NIV)
The Upper Room 4th January 2022 Daily Devotional | Tuesday Message
This year I have suffered heavily from anxiety and depression. I never knew how debilitating mental illness could be. My brain and body seemed to stop functioning. I had ceased my regular morning prayer routine and suffered from a sense of God’s absence.
Part of living is undergoing such trying times. We don’t want them, but they hit us at the most unexpected moments. It can be easy to respond like Job’s friends and try to explain them away.
Like Job, we wrestle with these experiences and wonder why this is happening to us. I have concluded that they just are. They are not the revenge of God or punishment for our sinfulness or random attacks of a meaningless universe. They are dark nights that show up on bright days. And somehow we find that God was always there in the midst of them.
When we experience difficulties, we can remember Job, who discovered that no matter what, God is. God is beyond all time, the Creator and loving Sustainer of all of life. So when we experience the darkness of illness — mental or otherwise — we can sit with two truths: challenges just are, and God is. That knowledge can give us hope to hold on.
TODAY’S PRAYER
Loving God, hold us in your embrace when we are struggling to hold on to you and to a joyful life. Amen.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
Because God loves me, I can hold on.
PRAYER FOCUS
Those suffering with mental illness
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