Calling Out to God When No One Else is Listening

By Janet Morris Grimes –

There are few times in life when you may find yourself alone, all family and peer groups stripped away for a season. Life has a way of bringing us to this chasm that isolates us from the rest of the world. It may be a circumstance, such as the loss of a job or a negative diagnosis or test result you were hoping not to hear. It might be the death of a loved one, or a tough situation a child of yours may be suffering that leaves you certain that no one else in this would could possibly know how you feel at that precise moment.

But what I’ve found is that these are the moments we see and hear God most clearly. When He is all we’ve got left, with no one else to turn to, He reveals himself in the most beautiful of ways.

Think about it. The Bible is filled with such stories. Jonah-I’m quite certain there was no one else in the belly of that fish with him to point him in the right direction. Saul, who became Paul, but only after being blinded by the light. Blindness must have an immediate effect of making one feel alone. Joseph, who was beaten by his brothers, dropped in a pit, and then sold into slavery rather than being left to die. These stories demonstrate abandonment at its best. Or worst.

Jesus faced it as well, many times, but the difference was that He knew what was coming. In the Garden of Gethsemane, just before being turned over to the enemy to be led to his own crucifixion, Jesus asked his apostles to “watch and pray” but they were  too sleepy to even notice his anguish, even though He predicted his upcoming death numerous times.

Jesus shows us just how to handle those situations that knock us to our knees, leaving us in fields of abandonment. It was there, alone in the garden, that Jesus cried out to his Father like never before, referring to God as Abba, which means simply Daddy. And his simple prayer says it all.

“Abba Father, everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me, yet not my will, but your will” (Mark 14:36) .

Jesus prayed for deliverance from his circumstances, and recognized that God had the power to change them. But He also accepted God’s will, knowing whatever He was about to face, He would never be alone.

The truth is that people let you down. Daily. And abandonment of any kind hurts us to the core. But it may be those moments when the world turns its back on us, that drive us toward God. He is always ready to meet us on the path, in the belly of the whale, or even in a pit, just as soon as we call His name. He is Abba, Daddy, the one who hears our cries no one else is listening.

“The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged” (Deuteronomy 31:6).