It is a question perhaps heard more often than not; where is God? In the middle of all of this warfare, hatred, and just plain evil, where is the Creator of the Universe?
Don't get me wrong. I am not an Athiest nor am I Agnostic. I am a Christian; I go to church, I pray, I sing all of the songs and know all of the cheesy preacher jokes. But at times I too have wondered where God is when we need Him. Whenever I see hate, I feel two things in this order: anger at what has taken place, and then sadness because I know that those people probably do not know God.
Perhaps this is how David felt. One day, he is singing Psalm 18 - "I love you, Lord, my strength..." - and then the next, he might have been crying Psalm 22 - "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" In truth, this is what made David so admirable. One day, he is praising God. The next, he is wondering where the heck God is. And then when God reveals himself, more praise.
Often I believe it is because we are the ones turning our backs on God. If you turn your back on something, will you see it? If you fill up your mind with thoughts that are not of God, do you think you will hear God? Charles Spurgeon said it best:
"The world hates virtue; it cannot bear perfection; it might endure benevolence, but absolute purity and righteousness it cannot, away with. Its native instincts are wrong; it is not towards the light that men are going, their backs are to the sun, they are journeying into the thick darkness."
When we journey into the darkness, we will often find ourselves in need of God. That is when we begin to question things; just like we would fumble for a flashlight in a dark room, we reach out for God in a dark time. Human beings cannot live without God. C.S. Lewis once said that "God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing." When we turn our backs on God, we will find nothing but turmoil in our own lives. That is what is why the world is spinning more and more out of control; when we embrace sin, we embrace death and chaos.
The truth is, God is there. He has always been there. He has never left our side; he is always present. Even when it does not feel like he is around, he is in fact there. And all we have to do is turn back to Him. In John 3:19-21, Jesus says "This, then, is the judgement: the light has come into the world, and the people loved darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. For everyone who practices wicked things hates the light and avoids it, so that his deeds may not be exposed. But anyone who lives by the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be shown to be accomplished by God."
