People tend to believe what they want to believe until they are faced with reality, and therefore God orchestrates tests and challenges to awaken people from their illusions to make them confront their need for deliverance. Such afflictions are called yissurim shel ahavah, “troubles of love.” For example, regarding their affliction in Egypt, the Torah states that the people groaned because of their slavery and then cried out to heaven for help: “And God heard their groaning; he remembered his covenant … and God saw the people of Israel, and God knew” (Exod. 2:24-25). Note the pattern: The people cried out for help; God heard (וַיִּשְׁמַע); he remembered (וַיִּזְכּר), he saw (וַיַּרְא); and he knew (וַיֵּדַע)… God knows our profound need for Him. Affliction teaches us that wishful thinking is unable to sustain the weight of reality, and only God Himself can truly save us…
Intellectually you “know” God is present, but there are moments of unknowing that obscures your hope. You “know” God is as close as your breath but there are breathless moments where you feel abandoned to your suffering…. Then you have to walk the darkness of trust.
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Where it says, “How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily” (Psalm 13:2), the sages remark that just as long as we take counsel in our own soul there will be despair, since only after we realize that no further counsel can help do we give up and confess our need for God’s salvation. Therefore just as Abraham saw the divine light by closing his eyes to this world, so we must trust in the LORD with all our heart by refusing to lean on our own understanding (Prov. 3:5).
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