Do you ever feel discouraged? We all do at one time or another. Maybe you are feeling discouraged right now.

• Maybe your marriage is not bringing the feelings you expected.
• Maybe being a parent is not what you though it was going to be.
• Maybe your job is not living up to what you wanted.
• Maybe you are feeling disconnected from old friends.
• Maybe you feel disconnected at church.

Whatever it is, discouragement leaves you feeling like an outsider at places that you once were very much the insider. You used to feel like you fit in, but now you’re not so sure you belong anymore.

This week I took some time to get away in the mountains to reflect and pray. As I have spent a lot of time with God out in nature this week, I have reflected on how much of my spiritual growth has come from times that were not in a church service.

As a pastor, this is a tough pill to swallow. 

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus has thirty-four intimate encounters with an individual. Of the thirty-four, one takes place in church. 

I think the deepest kind of pain ever had in my life is relational pain. There's a lot of hurt that we all experience in life. But there's something about relational pain that can hurt so deeply that it's really hard to let go. 

Maybe you are in a relationship that is falling apart right now. And in that process, someone has hurt you in such a way that it feels like it would be impossible to ever rebound from that situation.

Maybe you were betrayed (a friend repeated a secret), abandoned (a spouse/parent left you), or trust was broken (there was an affair).