It’s been one of those weeks where I just wish I could crawl in bed and be left alone.You know what I’m talking about: the kind of days when it seems anything that could go wrong does. You’re exhausted and discouraged. You feel forsaken by your friends and family and pretty much every person you may or may not encounter. The kids seem to plot against you in their maniacal laughter and screaming. Even the housework seems to pile up exponentially. Things go wrong at work. You get in a fight with your spouse. Maybe you receive devastating news.

In the hard days like this, it is really easy to get lost in your own self doubt and crabbiness: I’m a failure at everything. I can’t even do my job properly. I’m so ill-equipped to do anything.There is no hope. Why do I even bother?

It’s been that kind of a week, for me.

To add fuel to the fire, it’s Holy Week. So I feel like such a selfish monster for being consumed in mine own little brain when I know my husband’s plate is full, and I should be focused and meditating on my Savior’s passion.

One thing after another piles on and on like bricks stacked on top of one another, and I’m weighed down with guilt, shame, frustration, loneliness, and despair. And I feel abandoned and forsaken by everyone I love and everything that gives me energy and confidence.

And Satan is just delighted.

He is delighted that I’m so focused on myself instead of my Savior. He’s overjoyed that I’m distracted from the love of my Father. And during this wonderful, awesome day of Good Friday, he’s celebrating that I’m preoccupied with my own feelings of being forsaken that I forget the words Christ spoke for me on my behalf:

Despite my feelings of loneliness and despair, I don’t actually know what it is like to be truly abandoned and forsaken. Sure people – husband, family, friends, students –  grow angry with me, but I don’t actually know what it is like to be truly left alone and have everyone turn their back on me.  Because even if all the world condemned me, I would still have the love of my Heavenly Father. He will never turn his back on me.

But he would have, had it not been for his son, Jesus.

My God, My God, Why Have You Forsaken Me?

When Christ uttered those words, so long ago, he was abandoned and shunned by his Father. He bore the weight of our sin, the despair and anguish of rejection, and the hatred of his Father so that I never will. You never will. Christ was a worm: downtrodden and disgraceful, abandoned by his own Father so that we, the disgraceful, selfish sinners that we are, would become His children and heirs of eternal life.

When you have days where everything goes wrong and you feel like a measly, disgusting worm, keep your eyes on your Savior crying out for you on the cross. Keep your heart set on the love of the Savior who suffered the torments of hell on your behalf. Because of Christ’s sacrifice, we can trust with confident hearts the words of our Father,

I pray Jesus bless you this Good Friday!