He has said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you."

Yesterday I cried...a LOT.
That’s what fatigue does to me; it makes me cry, all the time and at everything.

Yesterday was hard, I am sure many factors play into it with varying complexities. But even though I was completely at the end of myself, in the evening I went downstairs to my prayer room to talk with the Lord. I talked to him like the worn out child I am, and though my questions, confusions and wonderings may have been simple, the reasons I was troubled were fueled by deeply embedded beliefs in who He is. Why did my circumstances not align with His character or promises? I found myself trying to discern between the enemy’s work and God’s hand, attempting to sort through my own heart to find if I was out of alignment...I wouldn’t recommend doing this when you’re fatigued, by the way.

I resonated with this line from Psalm 94, which rolled through my head again and again as I prayed, “If the Lord had not been my help, my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence.” I desperately needed the Lord, but where was He in my moments of need?

I remembered James 4:8, and wrote the words down on the page in front of me, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.” I desperately needed to be near Him, but where was He as I tried to pull Him close?

And for the first time that I can ever remember since I began walking with Jesus, I left my posture of prayer without restored hope. I stood up, completely devastated by the Lord’s silence and absence, and walked out of the room thinking, “The enemy is not suppose to win, that’s not the way it is suppose to be.”

I found my husband in the other room.

“I’m not okay,” I told him, “I feel utterly hopeless.”

The first statement most likely didn’t surprise him because my face was all puffy and red from crying and tears were still running down my face. I don’t know what he thought about the second.

“You’re tired,” He said, “Let’s put you in bed.”

I shook my head, completely overwhelmed by utter fatigue and said emphatically, “I don’t want to go to sleep without hope.”

Eventually he did convince me to go brush my teeth and get ready for bed, he kept telling me I was tired (which I was), and I told him, “I don’t want you to tell me I’m tired, I want you to tell me the Truth.” I curled up next to him, with my squeaky-clean teeth and teary eyes and he turned out the light...and then he told me the Truth; he recited scripture after scripture as it came to his mind, speaking them over me until he fell asleep.

For two hours I lay there unable to sleep, long after the tears stopped. I heard my phone ding several times (I checked it in the morning, they were texts of people who were making sure I was ok after I had stated on Facebook that I needed prayer). As I stared up at the dark ceiling, I thought about the body of Christ; His hands and feet and voice through others who are in Him. I have been praying through the daily prayer requests from Voice of the Martyrs for my brothers and sisters in Christ in hostile nations; nations with minute numbers of believers, persecuted by the majorities of Muslims or Buddhists or Hindus for following Jesus. And I wondered what would have happened to me that night had I not been able to reach out my hand to my Christ-following husband in the other room and put out a public request for prayer to my believing friends to lift me up from the miry bog of doubt I was sinking in. I considered how very alone they must feel, hidden or locked-up in the dark places, having to rely on faith alone to carry them through their confusion, doubt and despair.

And I was so grateful that I had more than my faith (which clearly needs strengthening); I had the Body of Christ--part of it literally in the bed beside me--to ensure I didn’t have to go to sleep without hope.

Thank you, brothers and sisters, for lifting me up. When I think of the verse from James on drawing near, I think that promise played out in a very real way last night; I reached out to Jesus and He came near through you. And I think that was gracious, in a moment when my doubt was so physical, to respond with a presence to match.