“I feel like I have been forsaken by God. Please help!”

September 2022 – Grace & Truth Magazine

QUESTION: I seem to truly feel like I have been forsaken by God and Jesus, and for some reason I can’t seem to shake it. I’ve prayed about it, and seem to be getting no answers. My soul is becoming dark and troubled. I was once filled with love and peace, but now I am being filled with hatred and dark feelings that I can’t seem to stop. It is like God and Jesus aren’t helping – as if they’ve given up on me. Please help!?

ANSWER: Dear friend, we are very sorry for you and would like to help you. However, whether we can or not depends largely on you. A major part of your problem is that you are looking inward, as the first few words of your question, “I seem to truly feel,” clearly indicate. Your question expresses your desperation. You need lasting help! But as long as you keep focusing on your feelings you will not find the help you need. I say this with absolute certainty, for I base what I say on the clear teaching of God’s holy Word, the Bible.

Let’s begin with a familiar Old Testament passage, Psalm 121 (NKJV). The psalms were the songs of the Israelites. The writer begins this song by saying, “I will lift up my eyes to the hills – from whence comes my help?” The hills might look solid and strong, but can they give help? Maybe the writer is looking to the hills hoping to see an army marching down from them to give him the help for which he is looking. But what help can the hills give him? They cannot do anything.

The next verse gives a better solution to the writer’s question: “My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” Ah, that’s more like it! The Lord is much greater than any hills or mountains. He is the living God, who made the hills, the sun and the rain that nourish the trees and the grass on the hills. Notice the psalmist is not singing about himself and his feelings. He’s not concentrating on worrying about himself or pitying himself. He is not singing the blues; he has a much better object.

“He will not allow your foot to be moved; He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He who keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep” (vv.3-4). Israel was the psalmist’s nation, his people. If the LORD keeps Israel day and night without sleeping or slumbering, the psalmist realized that the LORD will certainly keep him too. He’s not focusing on how he feels. No, he’s enjoying thoughts of the LORD, trusting Him to care for him in all that he’s passing through. He goes on, “The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade at your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The LORD shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve your soul. The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even forevermore” (vv.5-8).

Put yourself in the psalmist’s sandals. His confidence is in the LORD. He is rejoicing in the Lord, not crying, not moping about how he feels. He has looked a lot higher than the hills and has found the help he so badly needed. This psalm is probably 3,000 years old, but in all that time God has not changed. Truly, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” “He Himself has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you’” (Heb. 13:8,5).

Let’s look at another example: Jonah, a prophet in Israel who recorded a very personal experience he had. The Lord Jesus later mentioned Jonah, authenticating this account. God has included it in the Bible so we can learn lessons from it for our lives, more than 2,800 years later.

God had used Jonah to pronounce a very encouraging prophecy about his own people, Israel, at a time when they were in great distress (2 Ki. 14:25-27). But in the beginning of the book of Jonah, God sent this prophet to Nineveh, the capital of his people’s enemies, the Assyrians, who were known for their cruelty.

Knowing the merciful heart of God, as seen in chapter 4, Jonah went the opposite direction. He found a ship going to Tarshish, paid the fare, got on board, and soon descended into the hold to sleep. The Lord sent a mighty tempest, and the ship was about to be broken into pieces. In great fear the sailors tossed the cargo into the sea and cried to their gods. Jonah was awakened, told to pray to his God, and then questioned. He confessed that he was the cause of this storm, sent by his God – the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land. He told the sailors to throw him into the sea to make the storm cease. The sailors reluctantly did so.

But this is neither Jonah’s end nor the end of the story. God had prepared a great fish to swallow Jonah, and the prophet remained alive in the fish’s belly. Imagine his discomfort, his despair in this dreadful situation. Time passed; time to think. Then finally, from the fish’s belly, Jonah cried out in prayer to the LORD! He told the LORD about his wretched circumstances. He didn’t mince words; he described just what he was passing through. Worst of all: “Then I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight’” (2:4). Please read Jonah’s prayer in chapter 2 of his book.

Although he realized his desperate situation was his own fault, he turned to the LORD who was keeping him alive in these most uncomfortable conditions. He addressed Him as “O LORD, my God” (v.6). The last recorded words of his prayer are “Salvation is of the LORD” (v.9). Then “the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land” (v.10) – beyond the shallow water near the shore where Jonah would have to climb up onto the land himself!

The LORD gave his prophet a second chance. He has given most of us more chances than that! Our Lord loves us with eternal love and will not let us go, regardless of what we feel we deserve. He is faithful, and He acts according to who He is, according to His great faithfulness! Take Him at His word. Don’t go by your feelings. Go by what He says in His Word – the Bible. Read His Word. Take it to heart. Our feelings may be strong, but they often are also wrong. God’s Word is dependable, for God cannot lie. Approach Him with thankfulness; approach Him in faith no matter how you may feel!

Answered by Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.

Jonah’s Prayer (Jon. 2:2-9) “I cried out to the LORD because of my affliction, and He answered me. Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and You heard my voice. For You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the floods surrounded me; all Your billows and Your waves passed over me. Then I said, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight; yet I will look again toward Your holy temple.’ The waters surrounded me, even to my soul; the deep closed around me; weeds were wrapped around my head. I went down to the moorings of the mountains; the earth with its bars closed behind me forever; yet You have brought up my life from the pit, O LORD, my God. When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the LORD; and my prayer went up to You, into Your holy temple. Those who regard worthless idols forsake their own Mercy. But I will sacrifice to You with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD.”