Day 17

Nov 17: Exodus 14-16
There have been so many times in my life where I feel like I'm trying so hard to pray and seek God out for answers, yet I don't see any answers or feel his presence upon me. Needless to say, it's really frustrating and I would foolishly think that God is ignoring me or is angry with me and doesn't want to deal with me. The biggest realization I have about these times is that it was me trying to get things right. It was always, what can I do? What should I be praying about? I would get so caught up in trying to take control myself, that I would miss what God was trying to tell me.
The context in Exodus is a little bit different but I think it still applies. The Passover and all the plagues upon Egypt have forced the king to let Moses lead the Israelites out of Egypt. Once they leave though, the new King of Egypt has a change of heart about letting them go and decides to chase after them to take them captive once again. The Israelites start bugging out and forget that it was God who rescued them. When they complain and fear for their lives again, Moses speaks for God and says, "The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still." This is such a short, yet extremely powerful verse for me. Why do we struggle so much within ourselves to try to make things right all the time? We are always trying to take control of things with our human intelligence yet God shows us that HE is in control with his infinite wisdom. I think the harder WE try to take control, the farther we feel from God. We're trying to take over his job almost of being our Savior and provider. Sometimes, all we need to do is chill out and let him fight for us.