Faith Causing the Absence of God

So, this is what I'm contemplating today. The sense of the absence of God, and how it scares some people away and draws others closer.

"The more a human being advances in the Christian faith, the more they live the presence of God as an absence, the more they accept to die to the idea of becoming aware of God, of fathoming Him. For they have learned, while advancing, that god is unfathomable. And from then on the presence of God assumes value in their eyes only against the backdrop of absence. The mystic, in his long and complicated pilgrimage, experiences alternately the presence and absence of God. But, by degrees, the absence of God is felt more and more and the mystic understands that this absence is now the norm. Thus the mystic is someone who has had a long-term confrontation with God, like Jacob in the struggle that he \waged all through the night, someone who does not cease to confront God...What the mystic experiences...is a kind of distancing from God in proportion to advances in the deepening of their faith."
                                                                                                      -Jean Francois Six

I'm never quite certain how to respond to people who are doubting God, or abandoning their faith because they don't see Him. Don't hear Him. Don't get any answers to their prayers.

Partly I don't know how to respond because I feel like they've discovered the greatest secret of the Christian Faith: Many, many of us don't feel God, a lot of the time. And I think the above quote is right, that it's often not the result of doubt--it's the result of faith. Yet, because our churches train us to act as if we NEVER doubt, never feel His absence, never feel lost or abandoned because we don't feel Him as we once did, we're left to believe that because we don't feel Him he left. Or because we don't feel Him, we're doing something wrong. We're left believing that that which often comes as a mark of deepening relationship is exactly the opposite.

There's a quietness to the faith that carries on in the present absence of God. A gentleness much like sitting beside your lover in a dark room. You don't see them, you aren't talking to them (or if you are, they aren't talking back), yet even though your senses don't perceive their presence...you know they're there. Because sometimes the lights come one, and you have a conversation. But even when you don't...you still know they're there. And it's a gentle, quiet peace. A peace that comes with maturity of relationship, and less...NEED, I guess, of constant reminders. "Yes, I'm here. Yes, I love you. Yes, I'm here. Yes, I love you..." "I KNOW. I know in a way that means you don't need to keep telling me. It's okay. Let's just sit together."

I'm not sure if this is making any sense. Please feel free to let me know if it is. My head aches again, and I've only just had my tea. So...here's hoping this gives you something to contemplate today as well.

Shalom.