“Rise during the night and cry out.
 Pour out your hearts like water to the Lord.”
Lamentations 2:19 NLT

Most days after school, I spent fifteen minutes writing notes to God. I think I was twelve or thirteen. I didn’t even call myself a Christian then. But every afternoon, I peeled open a small, light-blue journal and begged God for friends. 

There was a group of girls who gave themselves a special name, and being part of their group was the hope of every junior high girl I knew. So I’d sit down and scribble my heart out to God: God, please let me be invited into this group. When I see so-and-so after fifth period, please let her ask me to join. 

Day after day after day. 

Finally, at some point, I gave up. I gave up on hoping to be invited in and on whether or not God cared. What I didn’t realize is that before I gave up, I’d been building a little habit. 

Years later, it was almost instinctual for me to open up a journal and write my heart out. The God I wondered about years before—the One I thought didn’t care and didn’t answer me, the One I was pouring my heart out to — was the One I now knew. And I already knew how to talk to Him! Throughout those years of honesty and unanswered prayers, I was building a posture I had no idea I would come back to like a muscle with memory. 

Think about your most honest journal entry. What if you addressed it to God? 

God wants our honest feelings. Our emotions and true thoughts aren’t too much. They aren’t a liability; they are a pathway to intimacy and true growth. 

The anxiety and worries that wake us in the night have a welcome place to go. The contents of our hearts do not have to stay inside and hidden. What would you say to God if you were twelve or thirteen again? What would you say if you knew God’s ears and heart were wide, wide open? 

by Tasha Jun, as published in 100 Days of Strength in Any Struggle

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