Unshackled Moments ~ September 15 ~ Longing For Escape

Life can be frightening, hard and hopeless at times, and the illusion we think of as reality drives us to escape, to enhance, to dream and wish for better. Life under the curse makes us homesick. The pain, misery, confusion and frustration of life on fallen earth keeps us from getting too comfortable here and from being distracted from the truth that this world is not our home. It makes us aware of our need for relationship with our Creator. Sadly we all try to fill that emptiness, the God-shaped hole in our hearts that we are born with. with other things. How long we do this and how much damage we do to ourselves and others in the process varies, but we are all guilty of looking for hope, joy, peace, love,  and reason in other places, people and things.

One of the ways I speak of my sobriety sometimes in a public forum is to let others know that I have not had to enhance, escape or change my situation emotions or thoughts through drugs or alcohol since May 17, 2010. I have found that filling the God-shaped hole with relationship with God works much better. But while that is very true, it doesn't mean that now that I have found the spiritual solution to life that it doesn't sometimes still get hard, frightening and confusing. It doesn't mean that there aren't still times I would like it to be better and feel better. Sometimes I wish I could still just make it all disappear for a while or be idealistically pleasant, comfortable and easy.

The desire to escape our life doesn't permanently go away just because we decided to follow Jesus. We may get homesick for heaven, pray and plead for the return of the King, or imagine how nice it would be to find that winning lottery ticket on the ground or at least imagine all financial pressures and worries fade away, we might imagine our life free of pain, sickness and or all negative consequences of our past. It may be something else, but when there is something in our life that is uncomfortable or hard or simply unsatisfying we tend to want to change it or escape it. God doesn't always make that go away on this side of eternity, but He can be our refuge our place of safety and escape. And when there is no escape, when we are surrounded, He is the mighty warrior fighting for us and giving us the grace to endure.

We can got to the mountain of awareness of His presence, turn our eyes upon Jesus and find the things on earth growing strangely dim, but there will come a time when we have to return to the valley of the shadow of our lives. We don't have to return alone though. There will be trials, tribulations and persecutions, and those things are not sought after or desired. So don't be discouraged when being set free from false solutions doesn't change the questions. The Comforter is available and Jesus has promised to be an ever present help in our times of need. Daddy's love can be an escape or it can give us the peace and power we need to endure. Relationship with God will make life worth living, but we are not promised easy.



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