Hello
How can I receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit? I am going through a very tough time in life & feel disconnected from the Spirit of God to help me through.
You have been in my thoughts. It is a difficult situation you are in. I also went through a sorrowful time, a time when I could not tell whether God heard my prayers, (or even, I’m ashamed to say, whether there was a God to hear), but God is always with us, and hears every word, and answers according to His wisdom at a time of His choosing.
I don’t want to discourage you by telling you how long I had to wait. Some of us are harder of heart (or possibly softer of head), and it takes us longer to hear what God has to say to us. Even to those like us, God’s mercy can reach.
Turn your thoughts often to God, Who wants what is best for you, and ask for the strength to get through this time of trial.
Jesus recommended persistence in prayer, and He would know.
You do not have to depend on your prayers alone. You could also ask your guardian angel, or one of the saints, to intercede on your behalf. If even I, who remain blinded and weighed down by my own sins, and know none of the details of your situation, can hope and pray for you, how much more so your guardian angel, who has known you all your life, and whose special charge you are, or a saint in heaven, who sees God face to face and is filled with His love.
A Prayer for you, adapted from
Saint Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians
*For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom His whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your heart through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.*
