‘For My people have forgotten Me, they burn incense to worthless gods and they have stumbled from their ways, from the ancient paths, to walk in bypaths, not on a highway, Like an east wind I will scatter them before the enemy;  I will show them My back and not My face in the day of their calamity.’   – Jeremiah 18:15,17

In Jeremiah’s prophecy to the Israelites, his word from the Lord was that a deaf ear would be turned on them when calamity came upon them from their blatant defiance in God’s plans for them.  They truly feared the foreign powers that were approaching, but their hard-heartedness towards their one true God kept them from drawing near with humility and repentance to the One Who was longing to be their guide and their protector.  Instead, they continued in utmost disobedience.

In Deuteronomy 31:17-18 and 31.20, God says He will hide His face from them (the Israelites) because they have become an evil and perverse generation.  The same message appears in Ezekiel 39, Micah 3 and several other Old Testament passages.  The Psalmist, David, praises God in Psalm 30 for delivering him from death.  Yet in verse seven of the chapter, he cries out, “You hid Your face, I was dismayed (I fell to pieces!)” Perhaps it was with a bit of smugness, maybe even a bit of pride that David said (in his prosperity), “I will never be moved” – and being displeased, the Lord ‘showed only his back’ to David.

Well, I get all that.  The reap-sow principle.  But what about those who have not been disobedient to God, have not seemingly been prideful, have not turned away from the Lord and still seem to see only God’s ‘back’?  I think of my godly aunt in her 90’s who has suffered in pain for years and has asked the Lord to take her Home, yet her plight only worsens.  It seems as if God has hidden His face from her.  And then there is my sister who contracted Parkinson’s Disease at 39, and just when you think the disease can’t get any worse, it does!  Has God turned His back to her all these years?

Love From Above is not the first ministry, not will it be the last for this to happen to, but presently it is being attacked by an individual whose goal is to destroy it!  By the way, I am very aware that “(I am not wrestling) against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places”.  – Ephesians 6.20   This has been ongoing for many years but has intensified in the past few months. Has God turned His face from me?  From HIS ministry?!  And, my greatest difficulty in this lesson of ‘God’s Back’ concerns my orphans in Romania.  All orphans!  They certainly have never committed great sin of any kind to find themselves from the time of birth in a most cruel and abusive situation.

I could tell of so many more times and situations where God has chosen to only ‘show His back’.  I have no real answers to this.  I wish I did.  In place of answers, I have to rely on ‘hope’.  That will have to do for now.  Until I see Him face to face.  He IS God.  He says that His ways are so ‘much higher than our ways’ – that we ‘see through a glass darkly’.  I must ‘cling to Him’, trust in Him, that whatever He chooses to do – show His face, or for a time, turn His face away, know that ultimately it will result in ‘good’ for us.  There are so many, many Scriptures to apply to this study . . .  My brows are still furrowed.  I would still like such crystal-clear answers.  And I’m still going to ask Him to draw me so much closer to Himself to not have to endure times of His back turned to me.  As a follower of Christ, and one who longs to love Him more every day, it’s a most uncomfortable and unsettling place to be. Hopefully, I will always be able to say with Job (19:25,26b) – “As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will take His stand on the earth.  I shall see God;” – (His face!).  I need always to remember that even in the darkest of times that —