The Dark Night of the Soul

I have been doing some reading in Devotional Classics, edited by Richard J. Foster and James Bryan Smith. This week's reading is by John of the Cross (1542-91). John wrote a book called "The Dark Night of the Soul." Many people today do not want to endure the drought times that God sends on our souls. He gives us sweet milk when we are young and we enjoy the milk. But to promote growth, God will separate us from others and place in a situation where we are not depressed, but where we are just going through a dry, dark time. Several years ago I read a book by Isobel Kuhn called Green Leaf in Drought Time. It is now out of print, but it is by a dear missionary who endured just such a time during China's turn to communism, but I digress slightly.

Part of the reason why God brings this dark time, according to John, concerns our emotions or feelings. Over time we develop a sort of spiritual greed where we want the next spiritual experience to outdo the previous. So we seek out "certain religious objects or holy places and begin to value visible things too highly." Hmm, I wonder if we do that in our worship styles, in our types of churches, in our worship venues, or in our Bible reading? When we do this, we put a demand on God instead of his having a demand on us. So God puts us in a place where the pleasure is removed so that the soul may be purified. "For a soul will never grow until it is able to let go of the tight grasp it has on God."

There are many of these spiritual sins. One of which he mentions is spiritual gluttony. "The sin of spiritual gluttony will prompt them to read more books and say more prayers, but God, in his wisdom, will deny them any consolation..." so that they will be removed from this sin.

I believe that spiritual sloth is where many are in our society. "They begin to lose interest in God for they measure God by themselves and not themselves by God." We approach God with our questions (and answers) and expect him to address us in our way and in our time. Even as Christians we do this, but God will not be made a toy in the hand of the child. He will take us through arid times to prove he is the oasis for which we search.

Read Psalm 42 and see David's response to the Dark Night.