Today’s Devotional: Finding God in the Past
Some memories are so painful that we avoid thinking about them entirely. Who wouldn’t like to forget that failed relationship, or getting fired, or that painful surgery? Certainly there are times in my life that are easier to ignore than think about.
However, our spiritual health often requires reflection on harrowing circumstances like these. We expectation that looking back will be painful, but what we don’t expect is that even in our darkest times, God was there. In this Slice of Infinity devotional, Jill Carattini writes that looking into our past is a great way to see the hand of God working in our lives:
Seldom can one fail to recall a time marked by restlessness in the stages of human development, a yearning for answers amidst turmoil or confusion. For many, it is the tender age of adolescence; for others it is the inquisitive years of college, the emptiness of a midlife crisis, the vulnerability of childhood. Though looking back at these formative events from infancy to adulthood may be for many like looking at a picture we don’t want to recognize, upon opening our eyes, we might just discover that we now are able to see what was there all along: another figure in the reflection standing beside us, the God who was there even when we were sure we were alone. J.R.R. Tolkien’s words offer a telling picture for those convinced at what they do not see: “The world outside has not become less real because the prisoner cannot see it.”
The stages and crises of development that most transform us are stages that inherently seem to bid us to ask the existential questions we were somehow meant to ask all along. To understand why a particular trauma of adolescence or lesson of young adulthood shaped us the way it did may be wearisome or frustrating, but in our attempts to revisit the formative nature of these years, we just may find ourselves treading on holy ground. As Joseph learned on his way from the pit to the throne, the God who startles us is Lord even over the process.
Looking back, do you see God in any of your most difficult experiences?
