By Bill Gaultiere © 2011

Jesus hung on the cross, naked and disfigured from beatings, bleeding and suffocating to death. He cried out Psalm 22:1 for all to hear, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

It was the darkest night ever (Matthew 27:45). Jesus felt abandoned by his Father. Many theologians say that because he took our sin on himself he was abandoned by God. In either case, he was enduring a Dark Night of the Soul. He felt God’s absence. He felt forsaken.

I’ve felt abandoned by God. Probably you have too. I talk with pastors, ministry leaders, and all kinds of Christ-followers who [...]

Continue reading The Lamb Became the Shepherd

By Bill Gaultiere © 2009, 2010

What do you do when you’ve been mistreated and God doesn’t seem to answer your prayers? How do you pray when God seems distant and unconcerned about your pain? We all go through these trials. They don’t mean that God is angry with us or that we’re not good Christians. It may be a dark night of the soul.

In dark night trials we tend to feel alone, but we’re not! The Psalmist understands and in Psalm 44 he shows us how to pray in the dark. Many of our Bible heroes went through these times, most notably Jesus in the [...]

Continue reading The Other Side of Deep Darkness

By Bill Gaultiere © 2010

From time to time we all go through trials in which we lose heart and feel overwhelmed with discouragement, worry, or exhaustion. The painful times are “Dark Nights of the Soul” when our prayers seem to go unanswered and God’s comfort cannot be found.

All Christ-followers go through Dark Nights when God seems distant and prayer and other spiritual activities do not yield the experience of God’s blessings as they have in times past. But few people today have been trained in how to deal with these spiritual trials. Inspired by Psalm 77, I wrote [...]

Continue reading In the Dark Night Remember God