Sometimes life throws curveballs that lead to some very low moments. Sometimes these low moments last for a day or a week. Sometimes they keep spiraling lower and lower to a place of complete brokenness and before you know it, you’re in a pit of sadness, hurt, hopelessness, and despair. Sometimes these low moments happen due to our own decisions, others happen due to the decisions of others. Others happen because of things that are out of our control.
But what if God allows these low moments to happen for a reason? Perhaps He designed these moments in our life to teach us things in the midst of them?
God teaching us valuable things during low moments doesn’t make them any easier. This is true whether it is the death of a loved one, a divorce, job loss, or just an accumulation of events that leave you with feeling lonely, useless, and unseen. They are never easy. But we do have hope. In Psalm 40:2 David says, “I waited patiently for the Lord; And he inclined to me and heard me cry. He also brought me up out of the horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth – Praise be to our God; Many will see it and fear and will trust in the Lord.”
While you are in your lowest moment, we can rest assured that as we wait on the Lord in patient expectation, that He will bring us out of the lowly pit. And while some of us will remain in the pit longer than others, He will bring us a peace and a newness while we are in the thick of it. The Lord gave David firm footing once again. He gave him a new stability. He will in turn, do the same for you.
But while you are still in the low moment, here are five things God teaches us during these times. Remember that these moments won’t last forever. For “everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven” (Ecclesiastes 3:1). So, let’s look and wait on God to teach us things in the midst of it.
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1. When We Are Weak, He Is Strong
In 2 Corinthians 12, Paul talks about having a thorn in his flesh, something that agonized him in his lowest moments. He pleaded with the Lord three times to make it depart from him. And the Lord said to him in verse 9, “my grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.”
Whether the Lord allowed this low moment in your life to occur, or perhaps He ordained it to occur for a season, I wonder if He wants to teach you what He was teaching Paul? That is to realize that He is enough. His grace is enough. His presence is enough. He alone – is enough.
We often try to climb out of the low pit, clawing our way out frantically on our own, only to realize nothing is working. We use all our strength, our own ideas, and our own solutions to try to take control of our situation. But after all that, it's only to realize that God is trying to teach us that we are actually weak, and He is strong. And it’s through these weaknesses and low moments that His strength will be perfected. The day when He sets your feet back on a rock, it will be because of His strength, not because of your own. Lean into His strength today as He may be trying to teach you the power He has, and that is all you need, for He alone is enough.
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2. Even if We Don’t See It, He Is Working
We often feel as if God isn’t working because in our lowest moment, nothing is changing. Or if it is changing, it’s changing for the worst, and we can’t seem to catch a break.
The story of Joseph is an example of a man being promised something, yet what he saw in front of Him was quite the opposite. In Genesis 37, Joseph is promised from God in a dream that He would one day reign over both the land and his brothers, placing him in the line of those chosen by God to receive blessings. Yet, his story took a turn. His brothers heard of this dream and decided to sell him as a slave where he eventually ended up in Egypt as a slave to Pharoah. He could not be in more of a pit, and further from what felt like God’s plan. The low moments didn’t just end there. It was one thing after another as he suffered betrayal, false accusations, and imprisonment.
Meanwhile, God was working in the midst of Joseph’s lowest moments. God’s hands were working on guiding his steps, even though his journey must have felt fully to the contrary. What might have felt entirely like a low moment for Joseph in being sold into Egypt, was God working out other details in those low moments, bringing Joseph eventually into a position of power and for Israel to be enslaved to Egypt where Joseph would reign. It turned out just as God promised, however it didn’t look the way most would expect it to look. But God was still working.
There was a famine that came on all the land, and the same brothers who sold Joseph to slavery headed to Egypt to “find more grain otherwise they would die” (Genesis 42:2). And it was there that a beautiful story of redemption and forgiveness takes place. Joseph and his brothers were reunited, and God did indeed fulfil His plan.
While Joseph didn’t see it with one low moment after another, God was still working.
He wants to teach you the same thing. He has a plan for you, and they are “good plans to prosper you and not to harm you” (Jeremiah 29:11). He has not forgotten you just as He didn’t forget Joseph. He was working in the midst of Joseph’s lowest moments, and God wants to teach you that He is also working in your lowest moment. That even if things don’t look like they will ever get better, God is working out all the other details. Every experience and low moment Joseph went through led him to God’s bigger divine plan. God wants you to know that He is still working in the unseen, even when our eyes can’t yet see.
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3. All We Need Is Him
One of the most important things He tries to teach us in our lowest moments is that all we need is Him. A few years ago, I climbed out of a season of what felt like one of the darkest and lowest moments of my life. The pain lasted for what felt like forever. I felt alone. I felt afraid. I felt unloved and unseen. I felt out of control trying to frantically climb out of the pit, and I tried many times crawling my out with all my blood, sweat and tears. I tirelessly tried get my feet to a firm footing, only to find myself falling completely back in the low pit and even deeper than before.
I was so desperate looking to other people and other things to make sense of all I was going through, when I realized that it was actually God who kept me there. In fact, He placed me there so I would come to a place of Him teaching me that all I needed was Him. He loved me enough to bring me to one of my lowest moments to show me Him. It was in that lowest moment, that He revealed Himself to me in a way that I had never experienced in all my life of being a Christian. It was in that lowest moment, that I learned the characteristics of God and the truth about the person He says that I am, and all the love He has for me. It was in that lowest moment, I realized I was forgiven and cherished and placed in high value. It was in that lowest moment, that I surrendered my life over to Him and I will always remember that moment of placing Him on the throne of my heart.
My lowest moment turned into a marked moment that forever changed my life.
While I spent most of my life chasing after lesser loves and lesser fulfilments, He showed me that He was all I needed as my One True Love. No other loves and temporary fulfillments could ever compare.
Sometimes we go through low moments for Him to ultimately bring us back to Him. I walked away from the Lord for many years, but the lowest, lowliest moment was in that dark pit where I made my way back home into my Father’s arms again. And I would go through that lowest moment a thousand times over for Him to teach me all about Him.
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When Your Next Lowest Moment Comes, Count It as a Joyous Moment
There is so much that God wants to teach us in our lowest moments. CS Lewis once said that “God whisper to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.” No one likes going through low moments in their life, but I know for myself that those are the moments that I hear from God like never before. Those are the moments where I feel closer to God like never before. As He is “near the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirt.” (Psalm 34:18).
I encourage you to embrace these low moments. And to not just embrace it, but to count it a joyous moment where God is going to reveal Himself to you in new ways and teach you things that you might not otherwise learn. James 1:2 says “dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it as opportunity for great joy, for you know when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.”
When we are in low moments, we focus on all that we lack. Let’s allow this Scripture to sink into our hearts today, reminding us that we can be made complete right where we are in the middle of our lowest moment. God is near, He is with us, He hears us, He is working, He is strong, and He can complete us with His peace – a “peace that far surpasses our understanding, as He guards our hearts and minds” (Philippians 4:6). He will give us a peace right in the middle of our lowest moments.
It is a joyous moment when low moments come, for we are becoming more faithful, more refined, and more unbreakable as God teaches us many things revealing Him and His greatest strengths.
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Originally published Wednesday, 20 October 2021.
