I Sought Him But Found Him Not

Have you ever experienced a “Dark Night of the Soul?”

If you’ve been attempting to follow Jesus for any length of time, my guess is you have.

And by a “Dark Night,” I don’t necessarily mean really hard circumstances — although that can definitely be an element of the major Dark Nights of our lives.

Rather, I mean any time or season in which God feels distant or dark. This can be a season, a moment, or even an area of ongoing wrestle and struggle in our lives.

In the Song of Songs, the Bride experiences at least two Dark Nights, the first of which occurs in chapter 3:

In our journey of growing in love for God, we will all encounter Dark Nights — seasons where God feels distant, where circumstances make it hard to reach for God, and when things just don’t make sense.

Have you ever been in a Dark Night before?

Or, are you possibly in one now?

My guess is that all of us have some area of our life — a relationship, our situation, our finances, or something else — that just doesn’t make sense.

What is it for you?

Some of us passively accept the Dark Nights of our lives with a sort of depressive “life just happens” mentality.

Others of us assume that God’s will is the opposite of whatever Dark Night we’re in, and so we pray against the Dark Night and ignore the deep work that God is trying to do in the night.

Or, we try to pray our way out of the night — but are either secretly (or openly) frustrated or mad at God that He’s not changing our circumstances faster or in the way that we want Him to.

Instead, I want to invite us to adopt the posture of the Bride in Song of Songs — Dark Nights are an invitation to search.

God’s distance is always meant to draw us closer.

Today, as we are on this Lenten journey of growing into wholehearted love for God, I want to invite us to bring whatever hard thing we are facing into our conversation with the Lord — and get honest about areas where we are perhaps harboring disappointment or even anger at God for allowing something to happen.

At the end of the day, Dark Nights are a means of grace and transformation.

They are all about the discipleship of our desires — God withdraws Himself so that we can learn to be more dependent on God and less dependent on His gifts, even the gift of His presence.

As we reflect on this during Lent in particular, the story of the cross and the resurrection invites us to reframe our Dark Nights as crucifixions.

They are not just hard seasons to get through, or circumstances to pray our way out of, they are deep invitations to follow Christ to His death on the pathway to resurrection. By embracing the crucifying power of a Dark Night, we become ready to embrace the resurrecting power of the morning.

One of the most eloquent authors to speak of the Dark Night is the sixteenth-century mystic St John of the Cross. His poetry is prolific and remains some of the most celebrated literature in the Spanish language. He writes (in a very similar style to Song of Songs 3):

While most of us would attribute much more negative language to the Dark Nights in our lives, St John speaks fondly because he recognizes their transformative power.

He recognizes nights as “guiding,” “lovely,” and altogether effectual at “transforming” our love. Ultimately, Dark Nights are God’s primary pathway to get us where we need to go on this journey of growing in love — completely united in love with God.

The “morning” that we are waiting for after the Dark Night, the resurrection on the other side of the crucifixion — is a loving union with the God who loves us completely.

Writes St Paul:

What would it look like to posture our hearts to search this week of Lent?

In what area of our life does God feel distant or absent?

How can we posture ourselves to bring that area into our prayer life, instead of avoiding it or ignoring it? What would it look like to ask, seek, knock, fast, and pray until we find God’s heart in this area? And how would we be transformed as a result?

So, I’d love to invite us to pray today:

• Begin by taking some deep breaths in and out. Perhaps as you breathe in pray the words from Song of Songs 1:4: “Draw me,” and as you breathe out pray: “after You.”

• Once you feel settled, begin to name with honesty: in what area of your life does God feel distant or absent? Or, is there a moment or season from your past that you are still holding with confusion in your heart?

• Then, simply invite God to help you bring it into the conversation. Perhaps pray, “Lord, would You help me to search for You in this area? Would you give me the discipline to keep this in my prayer life until I find You?”

• Is there any way that God might be inviting you to focus your spiritual practices over the remaining four weeks of Lent — either by fasting something to challenge God to fill a space in your life with his love or by adding a new rhythm of prayer?

Amen!

P.S. If you made this this far, I’d love to share that Morgan and I are embarking on an exciting new ministry venture this year and we are looking for a team of friends and supporters to come alongside us in some specific ways. A huge part of what’s in our heart is to launch 24-7 Prayer ATL into the wild! If you’d be interested in supporting us in some specific and practical ways, please hit “reply” and I’d love to share about what some of our needs are!