After spiritual highs come spiritual lows. After Jesus’ baptism and vision came 40 days in the wilderness full of temptations. St. John of the Cross wrote “Dark Night of the Soul” describing the phenomenon. Happens to all of us. Sometimes we just don’t “feel” the presence of God.
How do you get over that feeling and get back to the with-God life? Thomas a Kempis writes that you should do good works. Modern psychologists hold that you should consciously act the way you want to be and feel, and it will come. I wrote earlier about looking for opportunities to start the day by doing something good for someone. It turns out that that is good for your soul.
You are not saved through your works–God’s grace takes care of that. You don’t want to be like the early American Puritans who held that God picks some and not others. You don’t know if you’re one, but you don’t want the community to know that you’re not in the chosen, so you act like you are. No, those are false trails.
It’s simply that you can’t trust emotions. You have accepted God’s grace. But you just don’t feel it every day, every minute. What you do, is look for that first opportunity to do something good for someone. As soon as you do, then it’s easier to do it again. And that will help you get your focus back on God–where it belongs.
Tags: attention, attitude, Christianity, focus, lifestyle, Work
Faith Venture 
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