Our relationship with God is both an objective and a subjective thing. On the one hand, God graciously brings us from death to life, grants us faith and repentance, declares us to be righteous, adopts us to himself, sanctifies us, keeps and preserves us, and will one day make us perfect. These are all objective realities. They are true regardless of how we feel on a given day.

Our relationship is subjective, though, in our experience of it. What we know to be objectively true and how we subjectively feel don’t always seem to be in agreement. In these moments we must cling to the truth we know all the more. One way to do that is through meditating on God’s Word. 

As a practical exercise, I would point you to the 23rd Psalm. Find a place to sit comfortably with your Bible. Pause for a few moments. Pray to God and thank him for meeting you (because he does meet you in his Word, whether you sense it or not). Ask him to speak to you by his Spirit speaking through his Word. Now read just the first line of the Psalm. Pause and consider the truth that is revealed in that line. The Lord (who we know to be Jesus Christ) is our Shepherd. Why a shepherd? What do shepherds do? What do sheep need? Is this who Christ is to us? Pause again and give thanks to God that Christ protects us, feeds us, guides us, gives us peace, and pursues us when we stray. Ask him to make you sensible of these things all of the time. How successful is Christ as our Shepherd? We shall not want. He does all things perfectly.

Continue through the Psalm in this way: reading, considering, praying with thankfulness and petition. You may perhaps gain a sense of his loving and gracious presence. Or he may keep you waiting. If the latter, you can be sure that he has a perfect reason to do so. Continue waiting in patience and practicing this quiet Scripture meditation often. Jesus promised, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” He is always there with you.