For about 10 years I have felt the absence of God in my life and I have done everything I can think of, but nothing has ever worked. I think what initially led me to feel this way is that the world is full of relativisms. We have no method of judging our actions or thoughts on an objective scale. So in order for one to know if they are truly heading in the correct direction – morally, spiritually etc. – it is my belief that God would have to give a sign. My concern is that I am moving farther away from God. I no longer feel his presence or hear his voice and I fear I did something wrong that brought about this state. Even when I try and pray I feel as though I do it because I NEED God but after years of this bad feeling inside a piece of me doesn’t want God, which scares me the most!
This is a great question. The fact that you are asking the question means that you are thinking about yourself and your relationship with G-d. When you say that you need a sign what do you mean? Do you mean that you want to see lightning strike at your wish? Do you want to see someone rewarded or punished for their actions immediately? Do you want everyone to be able to see G-d constantly, and as a result, always act good and do the moral thing? That is a very nice thought, but it would be counter productive to G-d’s will. Now, based on your question you are probably going to say, “How do you know G-d’s will?” The answer is you are right, I don’t. But I know that through our tradtion, through the Torah, through our mystical writings we have been taught that G-d wants us to be able to make choices in our lives. If someone was in the army and the drill seargent said to do 20 push ups or he would hit you on the head with his night stick you would have little choice because of the penalty. You could disobey, but the penalty would be severe and immediate. The soldier’s free will is limited. Each person needs to be able to make moral choices without the external immediate rewards or punishments. That is the judge of our moral character. We are all judged based on our actions. That would be thwarted if our ability to make those choices was influenced by Our Creator influencing us in a visible way all the time.
However, I would argue that G-d gives us constant signs of His existence. He shows us through science, nature, and the existence of the complex world how powerful He truly is. There is a fantastic book called Listen to Your Messages by Rabbi Yissocher Frand. It goes through stories of real people and how if we open our eyes to everyday occurrences we can see G-d all the time. This realization is a process. It will not happen overnight, but I think that you should start to learn the ancient texts of Jewish philosophy and see for yourself. This question is not answered overnight and there is no shortcut to getting this answered. It takes courage to ask the questions that need to be asked and study the texts that need to be examined. I hope that you have the courage to open those texts and go further in your explorations.
Rabbi Litt