Disappointment with God

I had an amazing week away in the beauty of Sumas, WA. There was no internet connection to be found, I don't even think the retreat centre has a website, nor do they use email- but it was incredibly beautiful and great to just take some focused time out with God.

We learned and practiced Lectio Divina, breath prayers, worked through the low and high points of our lives... did communion every night. There were nine of us there, which was a perfect size group. We met a few times a day to learn different ways of praying and debrief our times alone.

While doing Lectio the second day on the parable of the persistent widow I discovered something profound about myself. I had lost a large part of my faith...

Have you ever prayed and prayed and prayed and PRAYED for something and it just never happened? Since I've come to know God I have been praying a specific something for someone... I've gotten friends together to pray for this, fasted, cried and believed that God could do something... At times things looked like they were changing, but never actually did.

A little less than two years ago (after 8 years of praying, hoping and trying to save this person), I 'surrendered' this to God. I realized there was nothing I could do and took many steps back from trying. My mental-health is wayyy better but what I didn't realize was that I had stopped praying for this person. I stopped believing God could do anything... and I think I've slowly lost my faith in prayer- completely subconsciously.

After a few days of reflecting on this I discovered that I've just been so disappointed with God but haven't wanted to tell God or admit it myself. It's hard when God doesn't answer our prayers- in our time- in our way. My breath prayer became, "El Shaddai (Almighty one), renew my faith". And I believe God is renewing my faith.

I got some one-on-one spiritual direction from my prof and one thing I told him was that I just want that child-like-faith back that I once had... He reminded me that God wants to mature my faith, that this experience is stretching me and making me wrestle with Him... but in the end, my faith will grow and I'll understand him a little more. So true. No one said the faith journey would be easy- but God is FAITHFUL, even when it doesn't make sense and it's hard, He is still faithful.

So I told God I was disappointed, I think he can handle it. And I've slowly starting to pray for this person again... Why does prayer have to hurt so much at times?

"El Shaddai, renew my faith again today"

My prayer life.

Ever feel like you're just too busy to pray? I think most of us feel like that most of the time in our lives...

I think the past couple months have been some of the busiest months of my life. We just launched Unite Canada 2010, Christmas, Urbana, trying to finish the hardest theology class of my masters degree, I got engaged, wedding planning, house hunting, celebrating... Life is great, just sooooo busy! Where do I find time to pray?

Lucky for me, I'm being forced to find time. Next week I'm taking a class called "Reflective Prayer for Transformational Leaders", in Sumas WA as part of my MA in Global Urban Leadership. I have about 1500 pages to read on prayer, which I just started, and part of my 'class time' is a three day silent retreat- Lord knows I need this!

So I'll be using this blog to reflect on my readings and journal through this class for the next few weeks- Please join me on this journey!