Why Do I Feel So Far From God and Lost in Life?

Do you feel far from God? Maybe there was a time when you prayed and knew He was near. Now your prayers feel empty, and you wonder if He is even listening.

Or maybe you feel lost in life. You are not sure where you are going, and you are not sure God is going with you.

If that is you, hear this first: all of us go through times when we feel far from God. You are not the only one, and you are not too far gone for God to reach you.

It is okay to feel far from God sometimes.

You might be shocked to hear a pastor say that, but it is true. It is okay to feel far from God sometimes. Why? Because God is not a feeling, but a personal being.

Think about it like this. There are times when I feel close to my wife, Jamie, and there are times when I don't feel as close to her. Regardless of how I feel, we are still married. Our feelings don't change the status of our relationship. They only change the experience of it.

The same is true with God. You won't feel as close to Him every day as you did the day you first believed, and that doesn't mean He has left. God's love for you will never change. However, your awareness of His love can change. Too often we get so distracted by the pleasures, pursuits, and people in our lives that we forget how much He loves us.

David knew what it was like to feel far from God. He prayed:

"How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?" (Psalm 13:1-2, NIV)

David asks "How long?" four times, which shows he had likely been feeling far from God for quite a while. There will be not only days, but sometimes entire seasons in your walk with Jesus when you feel far from Him too. So do not be shocked when you go through a season like that.

Tell God the truth about how far away He feels.

On the surface, it may seem like David was not in a good place spiritually. That could not be further from the truth. Being honest with God about your struggles is one of the marks of a thriving spiritual life. David was not trying to fake it to make it. Rather, he told God exactly how he felt.

You can do the same, because God would rather have the honest you than the polished you. Tell Him it feels like He is hiding, and tell Him how long it has been. When you do, you let Him into your struggle instead of trying to tough it out on your own. Being candid with God creates closeness to Him, so be honest with Him when you feel far from Him.

The fog does not mean God has left.

After David is honest, he asks God for help: "Look on me and answer, Lord my God. Give light to my eyes" (Psalm 13:3, NIV). He wanted to see and experience God like he had in the past.

Back when our church was East Hills Church in the Oakland Hills, our property had one of the most beautiful views I have ever seen. From the viewpoint, you could see the Bay, Oakland, the San Francisco skyline, the Bay Bridge, and the Golden Gate Bridge. On clear days, I could see both bridges easily, but on foggy days it was hard or impossible to see them.

Of course, the fog never made those bridges disappear. My sight did not determine whether they existed. In the same way, when the fog of your feelings clouds your spiritual eyes, God has not gone anywhere.

One night, Jesus' disciples were rowing across a lake in the dark. They could not see Jesus, but Mark tells us, "He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them" (Mark 6:48, NIV). They were not aware of Him, but He was aware of them, and He walked toward them. If you are wondering where God is right now, He is right next to you.

So ask God to clear the fog. He can show up and do anything at any time, and He may just answer that prayer. But there are also times when He intentionally leaves the fog in place, because He wants to test and grow your faith.

At the end of his prayer, David makes a choice: "But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord's praise, for he has been good to me" (Psalm 13:5-6, NIV).

If you cannot feel God today, trust God today for the goodness and love He has already poured out in your life. Jesus already showed you His unfailing love on the cross. He loved you so much that He was willing to die for you. That is real love! The same God who loves you that much is in control of the whole universe, and He is worth trusting, no matter how you feel. "For we live by faith, not by sight" (2 Corinthians 5:7, NIV).

If you feel lost in life, trust God with your next step.

Maybe you feel lost because your life has not gone the way you expected, and you don't know which way to go. I would say this first: your plan is often not God's plan. That is why the Bible says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight" (Proverbs 3:5-6, NIV).

In order to trust God, you have to stop trusting yourself. So instead of praying, "God, make my plan happen," start praying the way Jesus taught us to pray, for God's will to be done in your life, whatever that looks like and wherever it leads.

God doesn't hand us the full ten-year plan. Instead, His word works like a lamp: "Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path" (Psalm 119:105, NIV). A lamp lights up the next few steps, not the whole road, and God is asking you to trust Him with today. If you are trying to figure out your next step, start with how to get guidance from God.

Take one small step toward God today.

Today, you can choose to trust in God's unfailing love for you, no matter how thick the fog in front of you is. When you do, your faith will be strengthened, even when God feels far.

Daily Practice: Read Psalm 13 one verse at a time. After each verse, pause and pray. Let each verse guide you as you talk honestly with God about where you are right now.

You don't have to find your way back alone. If you are hurting, please share a prayer request so we can pray for you.

Pray Your Way to Joy: Finding Lasting Peace Through God’s Presence

Imagine driving home and realizing, ten minutes into the trip, that you are heading the wrong direction on the freeway. The destination you typed in was real, but the road you were following led south when you needed to go north. Many of us live like that when it comes to joy. We genuinely want it, but we keep following the wrong instructions.

The world offers a fleeting joy — fun that fades by morning. God offers something the world cannot: a lasting, eternal joy He gives freely. In our new Practicing Prayer series through the Psalms, we opened with one of the most joyful prayers in all of Scripture, Psalm 16, to ask a simple question: how do we actually pray our way to joy? The Psalms are songs and prayers — a great place to learn to pray is to take one and make it your own.

1. Pray for preservation

Psalm 16 opens with a request:

"Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge." (Psalm 16:1)

We live in a chaotic world that constantly pressures us away from who God made us to be. To be preserved is to be protected and kept uncorrupted. So we run to God as our refuge and ask Him to guard our joy and our character.

It is in the inevitable times of trouble that we need Him most. As the old saying goes, fatigue makes cowards of us all. Many people do not fall because of overwhelming evil desires; they fall because they are tired and they give up. When a nuclear bomb goes off in your family, your finances, or your health, God can preserve peace inside you even when there is chaos outside. That is a prayer worth praying: "Lord, I cannot protect myself. Would you do what I cannot do for myself?"

2. Praise God as the source of all goodness

Prayer is not only asking; it is praising.

"I say to the Lord, 'You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.'... The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance." (Psalm 16:2, 6)

There is always a reason to praise God, because God is always good even when life is not good.

The psalm gives us three reasons to praise His goodness:

• Relationship with God's people is a gift. "As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight" (v.3). You were made for relationship with God and with others. Real joy comes not from slipping in and out on Sunday, but from real relationships with people who really care about you.

• Chasing false gods multiplies sorrow. "The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply" (v.4). A false god is anything you love more than God. We often take good gifts — sex, success, finances, even family — and turn a good thing into a god thing, which makes it a bad thing. When a good gift becomes the ultimate thing, its loss shatters us.

• His goodness lasts forever. Scripture puts it this way: "Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever" (Psalm 136:1). God loves you on your bad days just as much as your good days. Your obedience may fail, your health may fail, your family may fail — but His love endures forever.

3. Practice the presence of God

"I keep my eyes always on the Lord. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken." (Psalm 16:8)

To practice God's presence simply means never forgetting that He is with you and for you — at work, at home, at all times, in all places. The question is not whether He is with you; it is whether you are aware of Him. Like a father whose child asks, "Please put your phone down and talk to me," God is right there, wanting relationship, while we scroll past Him distracted and busy.

Two things happen when we live aware of His presence. First, He counsels us. Jesus promised,

"But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you." (John 14:26)

The Spirit applies God's Word to your life at just the right moment. Second, you "will not be shaken." When you know the Creator and Sustainer of the universe is beside you, no problem is bigger than He is.

4. Praise Him for providing the path

"You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand." (Psalm 16:11)

This path leads to God's presence in heaven, where faith becomes sight and we see face to face the One our hearts have longed for. Whatever your single greatest moment of earthly joy has been, heaven will be infinitely greater. And because David prophesied that God would not "abandon" him to decay (v.10), we know death is no longer a dead end but a doorway. Because Jesus rose, those who trust Him will rise too.

So who is this path? Jesus said,

"I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6)

Jesus is not only the destination; He is the road we walk to get there.

The takeaway

Here is the surprising promise: if you make joy your god, you will never get it. But if you pursue Jesus, joy gets thrown in. Some of us need to call on His name for the first time. Others simply need to be rerouted — back onto the path of life we drifted from.

Reflection question: Where in your life are you chasing joy by following the wrong instructions — and what would it look like to run to Jesus as your refuge instead?

If you are anywhere in Livermore or the greater Tri-Valley and looking for a church family to grow with, we would love to meet you and pray with you this Sunday.

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