When God seems absent, I often try to take charge of things myself, putting on my “God Junior” badge and working to handle circumstances on my own. I set aside any previous reliance on Him and default to the things I can see and understand—the tangible experiences I can recreate and control.
On Mount Sinai, the people of Israel were impatient as they waited for Moses to come down. Even after God had saved them at the Red Sea, they doubted. Now they demanded a recognizable Egyptian object for their adoration, a mere inanimate object that could do NOTHING. They exchanged the glory of God, which they had witnessed with their own eyes, for a hunk of metal. And they didn’t just swap God’s might for their own. They actually worshipped their handiwork. This action was a rebellion by the people whom God had chosen, a disobedience “on repeat,” a failure to trust Him.
Moment by moment, I often forget and discount the blessings of God, ignoring them and dismissing His plans as unfavorable compared to my own ways. I fall into adoring the things I can see and touch, taking comfort in known earthly glories. But because of God’s love for me in Jesus, He draws me back, and I realize, “How could I ever prize something made from human hands over a relationship with the living God who made me?”
Then I want to shove aside all the shiny stuff that drains away my trust and return wholly to my Lord, who never fails to shower me with His protection and His love and offers me a relationship with Him that stands today and lasts forever.