God, I hurt...and I need You.

I recently was confronted with some issues from my past. Things that I thought were pretty far gone but have up again. It was tough to hear and even tougher to wonder how to deal with it.

I was pretty emotional and was one of the hardest nights I've had in a long time. I was unable to sleep more than 20 minutes before I would wake up in a sweat. I tried a different approach than my normal self-gratifying release. I actually decided to pray about it! Sounds silly after being a Christian this long...but anyway. I had to pray that God would ease the tension in my stomach and calm the fear in my heart so I could at least fall asleep, and He did. Then I would wake up 20 minutes later, all in a sweat, and I'd have to pray and give it up to God again, basically it went on like this all night. I didn't really eat anything Friday...I was (and still am) pretty emotionally charged over this.

But that night taught me that I can trust God for my emotional needs...of course we know this in our heads, but in my practice I was takign care of my own emotional needs and asking God only for less temptation or for more physical, tangible things. It seems so rudimentary that I would trust God for this, but in the twisted grip of sin our thinking becomes warped. Or at least mine has.

So I've learned a new prayer to utter in moments of emotional desparation, "God, I hurt...and I need You!"