A few years ago, Pew Research did a survey to find out what Americans mean when they say they believe in God. Although they found that a majority of people (56% to be exact) said they believe in God as described in the Bible, only 28% said they talk to God and that God talks to them, while almost twice as many (47%) said they talk to God but that God does not talk to them.1 The thing about statistics is that they always portray numerically what many of us already know experientially. And these statistics are no exception. So many of us say we believe in God, we affirm his existence, we trust what Scripture tells us about him, and yet, we still find ourselves feeling disconnected from him.
Our lives are complicated and, too often, chaotic. We’re daughters, sisters, mothers, friends, wives. We’re students, teachers, lawyers, artists, politicians, doctors, CEOs. Our day-to-day lives pull us in what feels like a hundred different directions, from late nights at the office, to weekends spent chauffeuring kids, to trying our best to be the world’s greatest aunt/boss/sister/girlfriend. Even so, the world continues to turn, rolling out so many hashtags, campaigns, social causes, cries for justice, we can hardly keep up. And while we do our best to manage our hundred-miles-an-hour lives, so many of us do so looking forward to the rest we hope we’ll find at the other side of one more deadline or promotion, one more bake sale or booster club meeting, one more blind date or pound lost.
This is, after all, what it means to live in the twenty-first century, or so we tell ourselves. And while that may be true, our longing for rest, our longing for stability, for something we can depend on, someone we can trust, is as old as time. So, we do what so many Christians have done before us. We pray. We reach out to God—the God we believe in, the God of the Bible—only to find ourselves on the wrong end of a statistic, on one end of what can feel like a chasm of universal proportions.
It’s one of the ironies of life that it’s in the midst of the hard moments, when we feel most disconnected from God, that we’re led to ask the deep questions of faith. Questions like, “Are you there, God? Are you working in the world? Do you keep your word?” The same questions that have been asked by countless generations before us.
Over the next few weeks, we’re going to unpack these questions as we study the covenants we find in Scripture. And as we look at how God has worked in the world and in the lives of his people, we’ll be reminded once again that not only is God there, but more importantly, he is here—with us, always present and always working in our world and in our lives.
1 “When Americans Say They Believe In God, What Do They Mean?,” Pew Research Center, Pew Research,April 23, 2018, https://www.pewforum.org/2018/04/25/when-americans-say-they-believe-in-god-what-do-they-mean/04-25-18_beliefingod-00-00/.
I’m struggling with abandonment from my family. God has been the sword and it’s been painful to accept.
I need God to show me how to endure. This pain is affecting me physically with gripping anxiety and grief.
I don’t think there’s an area of my life that I have ever really felt disconnected from God. He’s done too many miracles for me and my family to confirm His presence to ever feel that way. But I do want more. I want to move into a greater understanding of who He is and who He wants me to be in His power. I’m still trusting for Him to move on behalf of two of my children who are not actively serving Him at this time.
Jennie, I want to say that I love your passion for Him. It’s truly contagious. From the moment I watched your first introductory video several years ago when you started up IF:Equip, I was mesmerized by the Father’s heart that was clearly echoed in your words and that passion has not waned. Keep going. He’s using you to be a great encouragement and faith builder in so many people. You are indeed a voice for this current generation. 🙂
My teaching. I work with high schoolers, and so many of them feel so broken right now due to poverty and/or trauma. I want them to see the light of the Lord through me, but I’m often bogged down with the work and stress. I worry I have missed too many opportunities to just be with them and let them tell me what they need to tell me.
I felt disconnected from God for years in my marriage. However, recently He is moving in amazing ways. He has brought down walls in both of us, most I didn’t even realize were there. Not only is our marriage growing stronger, but I see spiritual growth happening in each of us as we become more connected with Him.
I need God to show up in my work life where my anxiety has taken over.
Yes, in all aspects of my life. I feel pulled in so many different directions and don’t make time for God in my life. I need to show up and put God first!
I feel disconnected from God and feel I have been in a static area for the past 11 years in bed 80 to 100%. I am up a little more these days, but I feel I’m really haven’t made any progress and that my health really has not improved. I had a punishing God and now I’m trying to have a loving God. I believe my faith am I trusting God is gaining each and every day. I feel really worn out trying to find doctors that can truly help me and want to help me. I have asked God to please continuously heal my body. I am pretty much in bed and the last two weeks I was in bed 90 to 95% with pain, chronic fatigue and six autoimmune diseases and trying to recover from a major neck operation in October and a lower back operation in August 2020. God just blessed me by putting my son, my daughter-in-law and my two grandkids back together three weeks ago. They left me and I moved down here to half years ago because I was so ill and they did not understand and I was not dependable. I pray that God will leave me to the correct doctors who can find the right medication‘s, nutrition programs and medication‘s to help her all these diseases into remission and to read me of constant pain from head to toe. I am allergic to so many medication‘s, that I don’t even know where to go from here. God please help me . I pray that I may feel you in my heart and my soul that you are truly here with me. Thank you
For me it’s community and my work… I feel like I’m stuck in a really silent season of no drive at work or to pursue community and I don’t hear Gods voice in anything that I’m putting work into right now. It’s discouraging and leaves me wondering if I’m in the wrong place, city, job, everything… I feel really lost in those areas in my disconnection from God.
FAMily is an area
Disconnected: work. I move about my fast past job to only at the end of the day realize I have not invited God to take part.
Show up: relationship with my mother. She struggles with anxiety and depression. I pray in faith that one day she is free of this bondage of fear.