Why Can’t We Always Feel God's Love?
An Experience of God’s Love
I have always been amazed at the experiences of nuns before they enter their vocation. When asked why they chose to live their former lives behind so that they can enter the convent, many of them answer with a specific experience of God’s love. Yes, an unforgettable experience of His love.
Isn’t it wonderful if we could also feel something like that? To really feel that God loves you and me. Not just through hearsay. But personally. Deeply.
If we can feel that we are loved like that, wouldn’t we be changed? Wouldn’t our fears melt away?
“To discover that you are loved is the center of all existence. And when we are filled with this total and delirious love, little by little, we grow and love in turn. That gradualness in our journeys is a sign of the infinite tenderness of God.”
- Chiara Corbella Petrillo, A Witness to Joy
Here’s a short clip of some testimony of nuns from the Poor Clares:
“I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees you...”
- Job 42:5, NRSVCE
What’s it like to be seen, to be watched over, to be truly loved?
If we truly knew God’s love, we wouldn’t obey Him out of fear or obligation. We’d love Him because He deserves to be loved, because no one else could ever be as beautiful, as kind or as caring as He is.
“It seems to me that if everyone were to receive such favours God would be feared by none, but loved to excess; that no one would ever commit the least wilful fault—and this through love, not fear.” - St. Therese of Lisieux
"If all were to know how beautiful Jesus is and how loving He is! They would all die of love. And yet, how is it that He is so little loved?" – St. Gemma Galgani
God’s Love Is For Everyone
Now we may presume that only the religious people like priests and nuns have this kind of experience. After all, they were the ones called to the religious life. But that shouldn’t be the way we see it. God’s love is for everyone, and that includes you and me.
“You shall call on me, and you shall go and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You shall seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart.” - Jeremiah 29:12-13, WEBBE
If we seek Him, if we truly search with all sincerity of heart, how could we not find God?
“If a person is seeking God, his Beloved is seeking him much more.” – St. John of the Cross
Why Can’t We Feel His Love?
This brings us back to the question, “Why can’t we feel His love?” We may even ask, “Why is it so hard to find God?” We may even have the experience of praying over and over only to feel nothing in the end.
While only God Himself can answer our questions adequately, we could at least have an idea why many of us can’t seem to feel God’s love.
Below are just some of the things we can consider:
God is inviting us to grow beyond our “feelings” of love.
While we cannot take away our emotions as human beings, and while we cannot strip away from our longing our need to feel loved, there comes a time when we must go beyond our feelings in order to love more fully.
It’s not easy to understand. But love is more than the emotions we feel. Love also includes faith. Love includes commitment. Love includes sacrifice.
Even human relationships can never survive if we depend upon our feelings all the time.
We may not be spending enough time with God.
It is hard to trust that someone loves you when hardly spend enough time with that person. Without time, there is very little opportunity for others to show you how much you are loved.
Maybe you can spend more time in prayer. Or maybe you can spend more time in the silence of your heart. Prayer is not only asking or conveying how we feel. To pray is also to listen to Him, and to be ready to hear when He finally speaks.
“Prayer is the inner bath of love into which the soul plunges itself.” - St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney
We may be attached to someone/something else.
Our ability to feel that we are loved may also depend upon our attachment to other people. Have you ever been in love with another person? While you were so in love with him or with her, was it easy for someone else to catch your attention? Would you have easily given your heart to someone else?
“Often love is offered to you, but you do not recognize it. You discard it because you are fixed on receiving it from the same person to whom you gave it.” ― Henri J.M. Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love
We may not be ready yet.
How many times have we heard that all too familiar line from someone?
“I’m just not ready yet to fall in love.”
We may be too busy with other things and we can’t prioritize our relationship for now. We could also be hurting from a past relationship and we’re just not ready yet to give our hearts to someone new. We’re afraid to be hurt. We don’t want to open ourselves again and experience being as vulnerable as we were before.
God respects our choices. He respects our time. He wouldn’t force Himself to us if we are not yet ready to meet Him.
“God is always trying to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them.” ―Augustine of Hippo, City of God
We may not want to know Him more.
We may have heard certain things about God that made us decide we don’t want to know Him.
Other people may have told us that God is angry all the time, that he cannot be pleased, that He misjudges and condemns people.
If our minds are already made up about how God would be, why would we want to even see Him? How could we even give Him the chance to make us feel that we are loved? Even if we see Him doing good things for us, we may only doubt Him more and accuse Him of trying to deceive us.
We may be comparing God’s love for us with God’s love for others.
We may be unable to feel God’s love for us because we are too focused on how He blesses other people.
In our minds, we can convince ourselves that unless God loves us in a certain way, He doesn’t love us at all.
We keep comparing our lives with the lives of other people. And if God doesn’t grant us the same things, we feel that He doesn’t love us as much as He loves them.
We may have felt God disappointing us or not hearing our prayers.
I think this is one of the most difficult struggles we could ever have in trying to feel God’s love. How could we feel His love when all we could feel is pain? Where was God when our loved ones were sick or dying? Where was He when we were being abused or violated by wicked men?
Even then, yes, even then, when we feel anger instead of love, may we not lose hope. We may blame God for everything, but in the end, He is still the only One who could save us from the darkness where we are.
You may also want to read:
Will God Ever Break Your Heart?
God has a beautiful plan that has yet to unfold.
Not feeling God’s love at the moment doesn’t mean we could never feel His love anymore. Maybe it’s not yet time. Maybe God is still working out a plan that could draw us closer to Him.
Even earthly suitors don’t immediately approach us and propose a marriage to profess his love for us. Many start by giving us hints of their presence. As time goes on, they may become close acquaintances or good friends. They wait for the right time before drawing us closer to their love.
Could it be that God is doing the same in your life right now? Could He be giving you hints of His presence? Could He be waiting for you to have the time to notice His ways?
My Experience of God’s Love
It is hard to summarize in a few words my experience of God’s love. His love has been a constant presence in my life, but the way I felt it and received it varied so much through the years. There were also special times when I especially felt loved, and I shared this through some of my other posts.
Here is one article where I wrote about an unforgettable experience of God’s love:
Let Me Tell You When I Had a Glimpse of Heaven
God Loves You
“Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed. Each of us is loved. Each of us is necessary.” – Pope Benedict XVI
Today may just be the day you must realize how much God really loves you. He loves you simply for who you really are. For the person He has created you to be.
Imagine a babe upon your arms. Imagine your very own child. You loved him before he was even born. Before he could even utter a word. You love him just because he is yours.
Try to live this day with the thought that God loves you. He willed you to be and He desires for you to live forever, to always exist. Never to be blotted out from His memory.
God loves you. At your weakest and at your worst. At the height of your greatest fears and at the depths of your heaviest sorrows.
God loves you. Despite all your helplessness. Despite all your doubts. Despite all your many falls.
God loves you. May this very thought draw you to love as you have never loved before.
“Keep me as the apple of your eye. Hide me under the shadow of your wings…” – Psalm 17:8, WEBBE
Following are some video clips of the song At the Foot of the Cross. Somehow, may it remind us of God’s great love for us. The first video is from the Korean film “Papa”.
If you enjoyed the first video of the song sang by Go Ara, you may want to watch the full movie "Papa” on Viu.com - click here. The song starts at around 20 minutes of the movie.
“For most of my life I have struggled to find God, to know God, to love God. I have tried hard to follow the guidelines of the spiritual life—pray always, work for others, read the Scriptures—and to avoid the many temptations to dissipate myself. I have failed many times but always tried again, even when I was close to despair.
Now I wonder whether I have sufficiently realized that during all this time God has been trying to find me, to know me, and to love me. The question is not “How am I to find God?” but “How am I to let myself be found by him?” The question is not “How am I to know God?” but “How am I to let myself be known by God?” And, finally, the question is not “How am I to love God?” but “How am I to let myself be loved by God?” God is looking into the distance for me, trying to find me, and longing to bring me home.”
– Henri J.M. Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming
“But while he was still far off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ “But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring out the best robe, and put it on him. Put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let’s eat, and celebrate; for this, my son, was dead, and is alive again. He was lost, and is found.’” – Luke 15, WEBBE
“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name.” - Psalm 147:3-4
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God bless you!