When Love Feels Like Dissapointment

It’s the gift of new music. The encouraging word of a friend. Snuggles from one of my nieces or nephews. The simple moments when I feel the love of God in the usual way. The usual way, meaning, the sense of love that brings comfort and a sense of belonging. But sometimes the Lord's love feels laborious and hard. It is the long road, the fight, the struggle. Sometimes, the Lord's love doesn't feel like love, it feels like disappointment.

Disappointment can be crushing, like the kind Peter must have felt in the Garden of Gesthemane when Jesus gave in to death, instead of letting them fight for his life and freedom.

I couldn’t help but consider Peter this week. He must have felt a lot of things in that moment. He must have felt scared and angry, and betrayed, not just by Judas, but by Jesus as well, who had just surrendered to defeat without any resistance. And he must have been disappointed. This was the man he had left everything to follow. He was supposed to be the king of the Jews and lead Israel to redemption, and here he was, submitting to what would certainly be his death. Expectations no longer matched reality. And not only that, they were God-given expectations. Prophesies he’d heard his whole life that were supposed to be filled in this man. This man, who was about to die, and I’m sure the disappointment closed in on him like a crushing weight.

This is where I’ve found myself the last couple of months. Facing yet another disappointment, that seems all the more stinging because I half-expected it all along. My history told me to expect it. And just when I had decided to stare the opportunity full in the face and believe it was happening, it crumbled in front of me. And I was angry about that. Here was a glimpse of a gift that was going to be given to me. The whole situation seemingly orchestrated by the Lord, and here I stood again, the gift being pulled away at the last second, as it so often seems to happen.

So yes, I was angry. And underneath that anger was an overwhelming disappointment. Not just in the deterioration of the gift, but what I thought that said about the Lord and about me. This disappointment did not feel like love. It was quite the opposite. It felt like being forgotten, unknown, and mostly UNloved. It was, to me, confirmation of what my heart is so ready to suspect. That I am tolerated, but not delighted in. That I am allowed in, but not loved.

In all this, I did not feel the Lord’s love. I felt a struggle and a fight and I felt exhausted. And it showed. Physically, I lacked energy, and emotionally, I lacked patience. I know those close to me have felt the weight of it or seen it on me. Eventually, I was just too tired to fight that battle anymore. I gave in to feeling disappointed.

But gently the Lord, as he always does, knocked at my heart. At first, all his attempts were met with resentful snaps. I didn’t want to hear his tender whisperings or his promises. I wanted him to deliver on the expectation I felt he had put in front of me. I wanted him to explain why he placed the opportunity, unsought, into my life, only to tear it away, and even more so, why he seems to do that so often.

But he kept knocking. For weeks he has kept gently at it, waiting until I would listen. But I can be (and often am) stubborn. And I didn’t want to deal with my own heart, knowing my sin was the reason this was so hard. So I intentionally kept myself busy. No time to be still and listen, I have to work, or meet this person, or finish this bible study, (funny how we can turn even good things into a way to avoid the Lord). Finally, he trapped me. He took my car from me, leaving me stranded and unable to fulfill my agenda for the day. I had no choice but to face him and my own heart that day.

This is what he showed me. Sometimes, love feels like disappointment. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense. Sometimes what seems like the best path is in fact not, and the most loving thing he can do is take us from it.

All this I understood. What I didn’t understand is that I had not gone looking for this particular path. He had placed me on it of his own accord, and then taken me off of it. That is what I did not understand. I still don’t, honestly. I don’t know why it seems like so often he places me on paths only to take me off of them. Maybe it's to show me that what I thought I wanted isn’t really what I thought it would be. Maybe it’s just to remind me that always, Jesus is better. Maybe it’s something else all together. I really don’t know. But, during that stranded day, he worked on my heart. I don’t understand, but I don’t have to. I can trust him regardless. I did not change my own heart. I could not flip a switch and trust his good plan in this. But he is faithful to work in us, and he did. He showed me that sometimes the most loving thing he can do is to open and close a path, leading us to the best thing.

And it turns out the best thing is just more of Him.

Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds. - Hosea 6:1