joy joy joy joy joy joy!! =)
That’s the subject heading to an e-mail I wrote to my best friend and future wife after having the most powerful spiritual experience. I try to describe how I feel:
And this incredible joy filled my whole body. I instantly felt completely forgiven for all of the wrongs and mistakes that I had committed. I felt completely released. I was able to completely release myself from any residual feelings of condemnation I’ve felt over my entire life. It’s like joy joy joy joy joy joy, as much as I could handle. All I could say was how brilliant God was. I had this stupid grin on my face that I just couldn’t wipe away.
It’s past 6am. I finish up my e-mail, describing the events that led to this joy-filled emotional/spiritual high. I stay up for another hour soaking in this moment and praying for my parents who are still sleeping in the next room. Whatever I am feeling, it’s leading me to want to bless all those around me.
“And this incredible joy filled my whole body.”
For the next four days, it’s like this. When I attend church, the sermon is saturated with meaning, as if God were speaking directly to me. I am glimpsing a part of God’s nature that I have never known before. The concepts of God being loving and wise are bouncing up and down my brain. During the refreshments time, I’m chatting with my friends and feel an incredible energy toward them, an intention to want only the best for them in their lives. Oh, and I’m funny! My insightful wit is on fire. Everyone is rolling in the aisles with laughter as I make one joke after the next. At least that’s the way I remember it!
This feeling lasts four days. I soon feel completely exhausted, emotionally and physically. Every night, I want to stay awake longer to pray and to continue to experience more. As a result of the little sleep, I have a blurry memory about the details of my spiritual experience, but I am left with two takeaways.
Two takeaways from the spiritual experience:
Desire to by physically and emotionally stronger
Awareness that something deeper and more enduring occurred
I want to be physically and emotionally stronger, so that if I were ever to encounter such an experience again, I would be able to hold on to it longer. Instead of maybe four days, next time, I could contain the joy and energy for a week, maybe even a month. I learn that my ability to handle such powerful energy is limited. My humanness eventually catches up with me, I reach my emotional capacity and basically burn-out. I think to myself, “if I just had a little more capacity, I can hold on to this joy a little longer.”
I also have an awareness that there is something special and short-lived going on. During the whole time I’m thinking: “It’s not just about the spiritual experience, this spiritual high. There must be something deeper and more enduring that I’m supposed to be taking away from all of this.” The next several years become my time to struggle with these deeper lessons. From feeling saturated in God’s presence, I fall into to a period of spiritual dryness, a dry and barren land. These are all words I use to describe a season characterized by the end of the emotions and energy.
Shortly after this experience, the Holy Spirit leads me into the spiritual desert. This is a season. It’s set apart by God. His purpose? To draw me into a more intimate knowledge of Himself, greater than the emotional and spiritual high. The joy, intimacy, desire, and feelings of peace fade. God’s nature becomes a mystery. I can’t see the God of love, goodness and faithfulness that tasted so sweet. Even my intellectual grasp on God’s grace fades. Sure I can recall spiritual truths and even recite them to another person, but they are not securely anchored in my brain. My knowledge of God is lost and mixes in with the all of the other things going on. Prayer is hard. Bible study is dry, and worship is a struggle – more so than the months leading up to this spiritual experience. “God’s not here. He is not leading me or providing for me.” It’s like this day after day after day.
Nine months later, I sit in my office cubicle – my second job out of college after my three-month stint as a youth pastor. I try to start out my day with a devotional time with God, but I can’t. Devotions are called “quiet times,” a bedrock spiritual practice of many Christians. So I start with a prayer, listen to music, and then read a couple of verses from the Bible. I meditate and think about how it relates to my life. What does God want me to do today? I’m looking for that time to meet with God, to be touched by His presence, to receive direction and clarity in my life.
I choose the book of Philippians. Even though it’s usually ripe with meaning and encouragement, on this particular day, they are just words on a page to me – no longer saturated with meaning as when I had my spiritual experience. It wasn’t even a tad moist, but bone dry. My quiet time simply falls flat.
Spiritual dryness: The end of the emotional high from a spiritual experience. The passions, desires, and excitement fade into almost nothing.
I’m writing to those who’ve caught a glimpse of heaven, tasted God, or had a spiritual vision, and now find themselves in a place where the vision has faded. I’m not writing to those who’ve not yet experienced any sense of God’s presence. I can only describe this season in contrast to the spiritual highs. It’s also different than spiritual lows or crisis moments that come from hardships and emotional/physical pain. I’ve experienced adversity and difficulties that have drawn me closer to God. The desert season is neither the spiritual high nor the adversity that we endure. It’s the in between moments. It’s the daily grind where there might not be anything particularly terrible going on. It’s the blah feeling we experience. It may look like apathy, a subtle discontentment with life, or a hardness of heart toward God and all things spiritual, but it’s more nuanced. There’s a longing involved, but not just a longing for things to be better, it’s that longing in the context of knowing they once were something radically different. The desert season is the end to the glimpses of God. It’s the empty house after the party is over. It’s the silence after God has spoken.
It’s the silence after God has spoken.
Observation - What jumped out at you?
Understanding - Did this reinforce something you already knew?
Application - What is one action step that comes to mind? Follow through.
