When He made us like Himself, God gave us complex emotions that help us navigate our relationship with Him so we could try to imagine the depth of our value to Him. Despite our incapability to comprehend the vastness of God’s love, we can try to feel what He feels and love in similar ways He loves. Only then can we rely on Him so He can cover our insecurities and failures. 

Our God wants to sit with us in our fears, failures, joy, peace, excitement, and grief. He wants us to be so engaged with the world and with Him that we are aware that we were not made for this place of brokenness, sin, and distraction. We were created for another intention. 

Even though David spent much of his life on the edge of despair as he grappled with sorrow, grief, anger, and empathizing with others, he experienced incredible hope of what God is capable of. David was not shy when it came to allowing his feelings to flow, but he anticipated that there is intention, purpose, and meaning behind God’s movements. 

There was a calm confidence David had in God’s ability to do the impossible. David rarely seemed concerned at God’s choices, because he trusted God to his core. Even when things get messy, scary, and most people would abort mission, David saw God at work and stayed exactly where God placed him. His anticipation was based on his own experience and what he understood about God from the experience of the generations of Israel before him...

I dare you to read this psalm (Psalm 100) without smiling. It may be impossible. When we read these words, the way the author of this psalm (likely David, but perhaps not) exudes gratitude is contagious. It allows us to focus on God’s goodness and how worthy He is of our praise and worship...

The absence of God is revealed in the encompassing feeling of despair. Throughout the Psalms, David was constantly facing despair as he forgot God’s goodness, faithfulness, abilities, and character. However, despair is not an emotion related to the current reality one is found in. Despair is a state of hopelessness. It houses confusion, fear, shame, and isolation. 

It is hard to wrap my mind around the concept that David, who had faith to defeat a giant, who was confident in God’s power and might, also was so frequently full of despair. It is difficult, perhaps impossible, to read more than a handful of Psalms without hearing David go on and on about his most recent struggle to defeat his deep feelings of loneliness, fear, and confusion...