Hey there. This is something I wrote today about how to deal with the bitterness we feel in our souls when we pray. I understand BPD and the extremes that go with it. I hope this will help you
Ecclesiastes 5:2 NKJV — Do not be rash with your mouth, And let not your heart utter anything hastily before God. For God is in heaven, and you on earth; Therefore let your words be few.
I have often found that I get few to no answers when I pour out my bitter complaint to God. When from the bitterness of my soul I speak to God. When I am praying like this I know my heart is not right before God, and I am uttering worthless words before the Almighty. This is not to say that God doesn't want to hear what we have to say, but it is to say that we want to address God in the proper way. We don't want to just say every ugly thing that we are feeling to God:
Proverbs 29:11 NKJV — A fool vents all his feelings, But a wise man holds them back.
This is a useful scripture in our daily lives and it can also be applied to prayer. The key word is "vents". We don't just want to vent every foolish thing that we are thinking and feeling to God; we want to be effective in our prayers and led of the Holy Spirit as we pray. If that is what we truly want that requires us to hold those things back. This is why today's scripture tells us to let our words be few before God.
What am I saying? Should we be afraid to pray all our hearts to God? No! God understands when we need to ugly cry before Him, when in our broken heartedness we cry out in confusion and agony. God is a loving Father who receives His children as they are. I have prayed many such prayers, yet let us consider the deeper truths of the scripture. I have not received many answers praying this way, but when I hold back my rawest feelings and let the scripture speak them for me, I am finding the ear of God consistently. What do I mean about praying the scripture? Let's look at Psalm 70 Psalm
70:1-5 NKJV — To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David. To bring to remembrance. Make haste, O God, to deliver me! Make haste to help me, O LORD! Let them be ashamed and confounded Who seek my life; Let them be turned back and confused Who desire my hurt. Let them be turned back because of their shame, Who say, “Aha, aha!” Let all those who seek You rejoice and be glad in You; And let those who love Your salvation say continually, “Let God be magnified!” But I am poor and needy; Make haste to me, O God! You are my help and my deliverer; O LORD, do not delay.
Let's say you are in an emotionally intense situation and you don't know what to do. Your heart is torn apart by persecution and betrayal and you need God to deliver you. In those times it is so hard to sort out our feelings to even know what to pray. Yet here is David praying about his own similar situation before God and his prayer was answered. The scripture is giving us a model here on how to interpret our feelings and pray them before God in a way that is pleasing to Him.
So when our hearts are heavy and full of bitterness what we can do is start reading scripture which expresses our feelings. We could read this in the book of Job for instance when we feel that everyone, including God, has turned against us
Job 19:7-14 NKJV — “If I cry out concerning wrong, I am not heard. If I cry aloud, there is no justice. He has fenced up my way, so that I cannot pass; And He has set darkness in my paths. He has stripped me of my glory, And taken the crown from my head. He breaks me down on every side, And I am gone; My hope He has uprooted like a tree. He has also kindled His wrath against me, And He counts me as one of His enemies. His troops come together And build up their road against me; They encamp all around my tent. “He has removed my brothers far from me, And my acquaintances are completely estranged from me. My relatives have failed, And my close friends have forgotten me.
When I feel like this and I know my heart can't express this to God properly I pray scriptures from the book of Job verbatim. It relieves my soul because I know I have both expressed my heart and that God has heard me. God will always hear us when we pray in the name of Jesus but look at what the Lord says
John 15:7 NKJV — “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. We need His words to abide in us, not our own.
We need to use the word of God to interpret our feelings properly so we can lift them up to God and be heard in a way that is well received. Let's look at another example
Psalm 70:1-5 NKJV — To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David. To bring to remembrance. Make haste, O God, to deliver me! Make haste to help me, O LORD! Let them be ashamed and confounded Who seek my life; Let them be turned back and confused Who desire my hurt. Let them be turned back because of their shame, Who say, “Aha, aha!” Let all those who seek You rejoice and be glad in You; And let those who love Your salvation say continually, “Let God be magnified!” But I am poor and needy; Make haste to me, O God! You are my help and my deliverer; O LORD, do not delay.
Here David is being persecuted by his enemies in an intense situation where He needs God to act immediately. My feelings in situations like this sometimes want to accuse God of wrong doing but David doesn't do that. He knows that God is good and is his only source of help. He instead pleads for justice and mercy from God, and relief from his enemies. A prayer accusing God of wrong doing will be cast away, but a prayer seeking God for judgment and mercy will be heard. It is very important to never accuse God of wrongdoing, but to justify His righteousness and holiness even in your complaint and confusion. This is why to be effective in prayer it is critical not to let your feelings lead you, but let the Holy Spirit lead you to pray scriptures that express what you are feeling and the urgency of your needs. One last note. This is also an effective tactic in spiritual warfare. Here is an example:
Psalm 58:6-9 NKJV — Break their teeth in their mouth, O God! Break out the fangs of the young lions, O LORD! Let them flow away as waters which run continually; When he bends his bow, Let his arrows be as if cut in pieces. Let them be like a snail which melts away as it goes, Like a stillborn child of a woman, that they may not see the sun. Before your pots can feel the burning thorns, He shall take them away as with a whirlwind, As in His living and burning wrath.
In this scripture David is praying against his human enemies, and we often would like to pray against our enemies like that too. However on the other side the cross we now understand a greater truth:
Ephesians 6:12 NKJV — For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Our enemies are no longer flesh and blood, they are now our mission field for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Taking blows patiently and being silent, even doing good to our enemies will heap coals of fire upon their heads. Instead we can pray these prayers against our spiritual enemies, the devil and his angels. We can ask God to look upon their plots and plans, how they have hated us without a cause. Praying this way keeps our hearts right with God and insures His protection and provision when we are being attacked by the enemy of our soul. So when you want to be effective in prayer, let your words be few before God and pray the scripture instead. Study Job and the Pslams to find scripture that matches how you are feeling and pour that out before God. I guarantee you it will move the heart of God for your situation and you will find the answers you are desperately searching for.
