I believe because my head tells me to

I was listening to Barlow Girl today and Never Alone came on. This part that always catches me of the song is the chorus:

I cried out with no reply
And I can't feel You by my side
So I'll hold tight to what I know
You're here and I’m never alone

I can’t count the times in my life that I have cried out to God and gotten no response, no feeling, no words of encouragement from someone He sent to me, no anything. It frustrates me sometimes. Okay I’m lying - it frustrates me a great deal of the time. Why does God have different relationships with people? I ask for the same thing such and such has, to call and He answers. Why does He make me depend on my head instead of my heart? I know He’s there, I know He is. I have to have faith, I just have to trust.

Sure I have had those life altering moments where He has come to me. (I’m going to show how Pentecostal I am right now, forgive me if you think that this is a bunch of crap). He has shown me His love in unimaginable ways, He has spoken to me and told me what direction to go in, and He has graced me with His overwhelming presence – so much so that I almost couldn’t breathe. I can draw from those experiences, but the mind is a funny thing. It can explain away those experiences as nothing, as my imagination, as coincidences.

Forced to rely on faith. That is always where I seem to end up. Forced to believe, because I have made a decision to believe.

I do not believe because my parents taught me to believe, nor do I believe because of the four years at a Christian college. I do not believe because I like Christians or being in church. Far from that in fact. I believe because I have studied, looked at the evidence, and searched my soul for the right answers. Almost 8 years ago I faced a crisis, where my whole system of beliefs came crashing down. It was in that crisis that I had to make a decision to be a Christian. Not a Christian that you think about when you think about the word “Christian” but a Christian that follows what the Bible says a Christian should be. I refuse to be a self-righteous, pompous, arrogant, shove-it-down-your throat kind of Christian. I want to be the kind of person God wants me to be; I fail miserably everyday on so many levels.

So I cry out to Him. Help me. help me. Why is there no answer? Why does He make me live by faith? Why not show me His overwhelming love? Why not comfort me and give me strength?

I know He’s there. I know He is guiding me silently. I just wish He didn’t trust me so much. If he didn’t He would be there constantly and I would know that that was God directing my life, that His presence was just a call away. Instead I have to believe with everything I am that He is there.

I just wish it wasn't so difficult.