Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls: Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
HABAKKUK 3:17-18 AKJV
MARTIN LUTHER went through periods spiritual darkness. He felt that God no longer heard or cared about him. He wrote, "God often, as it were, hides himself, and will not hear; yea, will suffer himself to be found. Preaching g or teaching, the word freezes upon my lips."
So what helped Luther break through the wall of darkness? It was the assurance that the God who could not lie had revealed Himself in His Word, in Scripture which cannot be broken; and that confidence in God's Word him through the dark night of the soul. The turning point was "the nevertheless faith."
Wrote Luther, "when one is possessed with doubt, that though he call upon the Lord he cannot be heard, and that God had turned his heart from him, and is angry. . . he must. . . arm himself with God's Word, promising to hear him." In Luther's book Babylonian Captivity of the Church he wrotes, "For God does not deal, nor has he ever dealt, with man otherwise than through a Word of promise. . . . Promise and faith must necessarily go together. For without the promise there is nothing to be believed; while without faith the promise is useless, since it is established and fulfilled through faith."'
You will never break through the darkness apart from absolute confidence that God will honour His promises not because of your goodness, but because of His nature and character He is bound by Himself to honor them.
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