Wrestling with God

Last year I wrote about my struggles as a 26-year-old single woman praying for “true love” but then realizing with deep shame that I don’t yet truly love the perfect, agape God. So at the end of that column I shared a new prayer for me in 2014: “To fall in love with God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my strength and mind.” I openly shared that New Year’s resolution with my church, my family, and my Christian and secular friends, confident that God delighted in my request and would answer it.

He did. As 2014 draws to a close, I look back to my relationship with God then versus now and can honestly say I know God better today. Not know of Him, or about Him, but truly know Him as an individual with personality, a friend and a father with immeasurable love for me. This year I delved deeper into God’s Word with a hunger crawling out from an ache in my soul that only ached stronger the more I pondered the characteristics of God: His faithfulness, His righteousness, His goodness, patience, wisdom, sovereignty—and the more I got to know Him, the more I fell in love with Him. This love started with the hunger, discipline, and meditation of His sweet, multi-dimensional Word.

As December 2014 rolled in, I boldly testified to my parents, to my community group, and even to my unbelieving friends how God had answered my prayers. “I’m totally fine with being single my entire life now,” I declared many, many times, eyes shining with joy and passion. “Because Jesus is enough. He truly is so wonderful! He comforts me, He lifts me up, He fulfills me in ways a man never can.”

And then, before the month was over, something happened. More specifically, a man showed up in my life, and despite mental sirens to be careful, I sliced him a big, fat piece of my heart. Long, silly story short: I let the unpredictable whirlwind of hope and desire puff me up into the clouds, and then found myself picking up my broken limbs after I was dumped back down to a world where I was once again a single, lonely, and hollow spare wheel.

This experience—and all the chaotic emotions that frothed afterward—crushed the assurance of my testimony into stale crumbs. For days I felt like every cell of my body and soul were moaning in a suffocated silence that only I could hear. My old friends Self-Pity and Wallow slunk their sticky arms back around me. Repeatedly playing the Les Misérables musical solo “On My Own” didn’t help, and news of fresh engagements over the holidays slapped me with constant reminders of my ostracization from the world of lovey-dovey pairs.

Several times I cried out to God, asking Him if my proclaimed love and satisfaction in Him was a lie. And why, why, oh why won’t God just take this desire for love away from me? Why couldn’t He just rip away this crippling distraction so that I can fully dedicate my entire being and thoughts to serving Him? If only I could live a simplified life of blissful chastity, reserving the love I would have given to a man to God and others who are unloved and suffering. When I presented my 2014 prayer of loving God, the image I had of myself was that of a strong, single-minded, visionary woman racing on a straight path toward God’s purpose in life for me—and didn’t God want that too?

Instead, I felt power and security bleed out from every stab of envy, unrequited desire, and dissatisfaction. At times I felt so weak and breathless that my mind couldn’t formulate an articulate prayer. During those times, all I did was cry out, “Lord, Lord, help me!” or recite chunks of Psalm 42 to myself: “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.”

And God is good. Oh, He is so good and gracious and kind and steadfast. Knowing I would need it, He had been feeding me the nourishment of His words throughout 2014, and even as I groaned in bed feeling like the wind was knocked out of me, His spirit whispered to me the stories of His promises and fulfillments in the Bible. He sent human angels to tend to me through my family and friends. One Christian sister even showed up at my doorstep despite my stubborn protests, just to give me a hug and pray out loud for me.

But the most powerful healing took place when I prayed directly to God in my private sanctuary. Through unceasing prayers, I found myself wrestling with God, just as Jacob wrestled the angelic stranger in desperation and despair before God blessed him and changed his name to “Israel.” And as I wrestled, I felt pain and fear, but I was also simultaneously clinging onto God in that struggle, pleading for His understanding and mercy and grace.

That’s when I understood: God desires my struggles; He desires for me to wrestle with Him through constant prayers of petition, intercession, and intense, honest questioning. Life on earth is not a video game where I blast my struggles and weaknesses away with a click of a button. No, it’s a long, gradual process of self-sacrificing, endurance-testing, character-building, life-molding struggles. It’s messy and terrifying, but it’s altogether mysterious and humbling and savory and sweet. How prideful and naïve I was to think that I could simply overcome this struggle with a zap and skip on to the next—without much scraping and bruises from a hard-fought, well-won battle.

Now 27, still single, and admittedly still lonely at times, my prayer for 2015 is to practice and experience the detailed power of prayer grounded in the gospel and led by the Spirit. Yes, I’m praying to pray: I want to learn how to pray, when to pray, and who to pray for—and I want to start flexing the muscles of spiritual discernment through vigilant prayer.

This coming year I know I’ll be struggling with some of the same issues I struggled with in previous years. And I cannot wait—because this time I’ll be fighting with eyes wide-open, ears sensitive to the tune of the Holy Spirit, and arms gripping the shoulders of God.