Wendy, this is from Jack Kelly's "Grace through Faith" I think it'll be helpful.Q:My question is mainly why I feel so “unspecial” to God. I’ve been a Christian for over 20 years and God truly is my first love. Nothing is more important to me than Him. I couldn’t care less about wealth, beauty, fame, success, etc.
Please don’t think I’m tooting my own horn- not at all! This is also for other Christians in the same boat who are committed to Him and seek Him to the extent I do and still feel rejected. It actually comes down to this: I have tried SO HARD to actually build a relationship with God but feel like I’m nothing to Him.
I’ve never had anything miraculous like an angelic encounter, a vision, or some supernatural experience from God that so many others claim to have. I have begged and prayed for over 20 years that God would reveal Himself to me and make Himself real to me.
To be honest, it makes me bitter because I feel like we’re nothing to Him. I know it isn’t true but in my humanity, it is how I truly feel. I still love Him but feel like there is a wall between us. I have prayed, pleaded and begged. Nothing. I have told God I am scared and to please minister to me. Nothing. Then I hear of people who claim to have had dozens of visions from God and angelic encounters and how God has come to them and revealed himself to them.
Why not me and why not so many others who have sought out God with all their heart? Why do some receive such a blessing while others are left struggling with our faith and feel rejected?
I’m not going to lie. I am a minister, love God with all my being, and pray and read my Bible for hours a day. Nothing.
I was ministering just the other day to a Christian. He actually told me that God loves Him more and considers him more important than me because he has had several visions since childhood while I have had nothing. WHAT?!
I’m terrified Christianity isn’t real (and that I have wasted my time being a minister when I don’t even know for sure), disheartened, and feel so rejected.
A: Let me try to answer your question this way. Matt 7:7-8 is a promise that guarantees eternal life, not a revelation from God. When we ask God to forgive our sins and grant us a place in His Kingdom, He’ll do it.
If you want confirmation that God is real there’s a way to get it. But it isn’t pleading with Him to prove Himself to you. Romans 1:18-20 says that He’s already done that.
If you want to be convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is real, start studying prophecy. I’m not talking about the End Times here. I’m talking about the thousands of prophecies He’s already fulfilled. Read Isaiah 44:6-7:
“This is what the LORD says– Israel’s King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty: I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God.
Who then is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and lay out before me what has happened since I established my ancient people, and what is yet to come–yes, let him foretell what will come.”
Here the Lord said that one of the two tests that anyone claiming to be God has to meet is to have foretold history. The other is to have foretold the future. We can’t verify the future but we can verify the past. We can prove that God exists by seeing if what He said would happen has actually happened.
Here’s one example. Did He say that after a prolonged period when Israel didn’t exist in the world, the nation would one day re-appear? This was something no other ancient nation had done, yet He said Israel would do it. Did they? There are thousands of other examples. In one chapter, Daniel 11, there are 135 historically validated fulfilled prophecies. How many would it take to convince you?
In Jeremiah 29:13 He promised that we would find Him when we seek Him with all of our heart. Seeking Him is not standing where we are and begging Him to appear to us. It’s diligently looking for Him, and the place you’ll find Him is in His word.
In Isaiah 45:19 He said,
“I have not spoken in secret, from somewhere in a land of darkness; I have not said to Jacob’s descendants, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I, the LORD, speak the truth; I declare what is right.”
We don’t seek Him in vain when we seek Him in what He has spoken. You being a minister, perhaps he wants you to become more acquainted with Him through His word. In that way, you can more effectively help others find Him too, instead of having to rely on personal experiences that you can’t replicate for them. And best of all you’ll have an unshakable faith, based in logic, not subject to the whims of emotion. In other words, you’ll have both zeal and knowledge.
link
