It is an honor to have you as a donor member! Share today. My Visit to The Cave of DespairDr. Stephen Phinney: Loneliness Is Eating My Victory. The shadows of my cave are crafting ways to overpower me.
When the Cave Called My Name:In my experience, there comes the point—often after your boldest stand, your clearest obedience, your loudest prayers—when the silence deafens, and the heart trembles under the weight of unmet expectations. Like Elijah on Mount Carmel, we contend with fire, speak truth against the tide, and expect revival, brotherly support, and encouragement. But what happens when the fire falls... and Jezebel still sends death threats? I would never dare compare myself to Elijah—his courage, his calling, his legacy being sung through eternity in ways far beyond me.Yet still... it hurts.To carry a burden for truth in a time that scrolls past it. To speak what’s given with trembling obedience, and watch it go unseen, unheard, or unheeded. While my flesh seeks fire from heaven and the roar of crowds—I only long to be faithful. But in quieter moments, like tonight, I confess: the loneliness of the mantle presses heavy. Not only because I want to be heard but because I wonder if the labor even matters. Still, through the darkness of this cave, I trust the One who sees in secret, and I hold to the hope that even obscure obedience is precious in His sight. Tonight in bed, I found myself under my own broom tree—spiritually drained, heart aching with the grief of “I have had enough, Lord.” Despair didn’t only come because I was weak; it arrived because I tend to run to my cave when suffering. It came because I had poured out. Every word crafted, every prayer lifted, every act of service given in faith felt unnoticed. I had labored in the Kingdom, yet the culture seemed to slip further into darkness. I believed obedience would yield a breakthrough. Instead, I felt exiled. So I ran—not geographically, but inward. Into the cave of silence. Into the place where questions grow louder and answers feel sparse. And just as with Elijah, God didn’t meet me with fire or earthquakes. Not with another prophecy nor the applause of men. He came in a whisper. He asked Elijah, “What are you doing here?” Not in accusation, but in tenderness. As if to say, “You are not forgotten. You are not alone. You are not finished.” I don’t say it with pride, but in the depths of my despair, I rejected the whisper of God. Not because I doubted He was speaking, but because I feared He wasn’t staying, and I would return to my vomit of loneliness. His silence felt sharper than a rebuke, and my soul—bruised by weariness and unmet hope—chose the cave over the calling. I turned my face from the still, small voice because it felt too gentle for the storm inside me. But even then, grace waited. The whisper didn’t grow louder—it waited for my heart to quiet. And I am learning that even when I push Him away in sorrow, He stays near, whispering still. I wanted thunder. I wanted a voice that split the sky, that confirmed my worth with noise too loud for doubt.Instead, I got a whisper—soft, holy, maddening. I fought it, clawed at silence, begged for clarity, wrapped in fire, and was overwhelmed with giving up. But the whisper asked for stillness, and I wasn’t ready to surrender my storm. So I turned inward, bitter and proud, until all I could hear were my own thoughts screaming in the hollow chamber of self. I’d rejected the only voice that came near—not because it failed to speak, but because it refused to flatter my unrest. In my hunger for a shout, I silenced the gentle mercy I needed most. In my silence, He spoke!Stephen, why do you doubt Me? You allow the waves of a troubled world to comb over your soul like waves of the sea. Do the people listen to My Son? Why should you expect greater results than He? Do you have good reasons to despair? Is death better than My life within you? I am not finished with you. We have great work yet to be accomplished. Lift your head up, sorrow no more. For I, your Lord, have released tragedy upon the world, and I need all my prophets to step forward. Stephen, this includes you. Always know you are never alone. Now, rise and write My words. In that sacred stillness, He didn’t just soothe my pain—He recommissioned my purpose. Like Elijah, He whispered of remnant faithfulness I could not see. He reminded me that my despair was not the end of the story—it was the threshold of renewal. Tonight, He stirred in me a fresh call, not to abandon the mission, but to walk in it with new clarity and surrendered strength. The cave was never the destination. It was the classroom. And from it, I am slowly emerging—not unscarred, but recalibrated. As I write this, I’m not completely out of the cave, but I will walk out not with fire in my hands, but with fire in my bones—ready once more to confront, anoint, to speak, to lead, and to trust in my God even when I “feel” defeated. I have never enjoyed being a prophet of God—not in the human sense, not in the soul's longing for comfort or applause. To speak what few want to hear, to bear burdens not of your own making, to carry the ache of heaven’s sorrow in a world that shrugs it off—it is the loneliest place on earth. Humanly speaking, it is a path marked by misunderstanding, isolation, and nights, like tonight, where even prayer feels unanswered. Yet I walk it still. Not always for joy, but for obedience. Not because I chose it, but because He did. And somehow, even in the ache, that is enough. Center for Eschatological Studies | The End Times Chronicles is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
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