It is a comforting truth that God may manifest Himself powerfully in the small details of your life (helping you find lost keys or sending a friend at just the right moment) while being seemingly absent in the larger issues. As He allows agency and life’s circumstances to unfold, He does not resolve all conflict and difficulty. In these situations, He stands beside us and often, I believe, weeps with us as sorrow and hardships transpire in His imperfect, beloved world. The key is to not become myopic and see only what is right in front of you—just the beautiful or only the terrible—and draw narrow and often incorrect conclusions.
Janalee Emmer, "The Transformative Power of Faith and Art", BYU Speeches, March 9, 2021
Sometimes I think that I'm going through these challenges alone, that nobody can truly understand what I'm going through. Sometimes I even wonder why I am going through them. Sometimes I wonder where God is. I obviously know that I'm not doing this alone, even though it feels that way sometimes, especially when I tend to feel sorry for myself.
My problem is that sometimes I do become myopic, or nearsighted. I only see what's in front of me. I focus on the tree but neglect seeing the forest, you can say. And, right now, there's a pretty big tree, or challenge, right in front of me... so I tend to just focus on that. And that causes me to neglect the bigger picture, to neglect everything else.
But I need to always remind myself that I am not facing this challenge, and these challenges, alone. I have family with me. I have friends with me. Most importantly, I have Christ with me. He weeps when I stumble. He weeps when I struggle.
I need to always think of Him as right there next to me. Not some overarching influence that I feel which accompanies me, but He, a real life person, right next to me, albeit hidden from my mortal eyes.