04/21/13

I feel the need to discuss something today.

It is something I have discussed on here before.  In fact, I posted about it in October 2011, here.

I recently read a blog post someone had shared on Facebook that detailed this very same thing.  I shared it on my page.  I saw ME in his post.

What am I meaning?

Anxiety/Depression/OCD.

I have it... and I am not talking about getting anxious on a "normal" level.  So many people misunderstand that.

I lived with it for 38 or so years before I realized exactly what it was.


I have had many comments over the years of Christians meaning well but telling me  "Just pray about it!" or when I explain some things "Oh, so this isn't a spiritual problem?"

During those years I thought it was "just me."  Which, it was.... but not exactly in the way they were meaning.

I thought I was not spiritual enough.  I thought I apparently had not really known the Lord and I needed to get some things straight.... repeatedly.

I prayed.

I searched the Scriptures.

I memorized Scripture and repeated it over and over.

I read Christian books.

I went to counseling.

I wanted to know what it was that caused me to not "think right."

No matter what I did to ask the Lord to give me greater faith, help me not feel so worried/anxious, etc... it never went away.

I covered it.  I never wanted anyone to know..... I was always doubting my faith in the Lord.

That is, until the Lord guided my paths to reveal to me that I needed something more.  I needed medication to help me because the serotonin levels in my brain were not right.

It is amazing to me when I hear other Christians say that taking medication for this is not having enough faith in the Lord.

What a dark hole I remember in my life during those few years mine became intense.  What guidance the Lord gave me to show me it wasn't about what I was doing wrong, but what was WRONG with my sin-cursed body!

You would not go to a diabetic and tell them that they are not having enough faith so stop taking that insulin and get right with God.

You would not tell a cancer patient that apparently their spiritual life is in disarray so they need to get in the Scriptures more and it will be better.

You would not tell someone with rheumatoid arthritis that they need to pray more and their pain in the joints will go away.

You would not tell someone with a tumor not to seek the help they need from trained professionals to see if surgery would take care of the problem or if there is something more to it.

Why, then, do Christians so often jump to the conclusion that when someone is facing anxiety/depression/etc... that they have a spiritual problem and need to have more faith in God?

BECAUSE of the path the Lord led me to the right people to reveal what I did have,
and the wisdom of the doctor to prescribe something that would cause my serotonin levels to become what they should be,
I am able to GRASP the Word of God and TRUST what He has says in ways I couldn't grasp before because my brain was constantly in panic.

I can now understand better Paul's verses in Romans -

Romans 8:26-28

And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words;

and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because he intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

I continually see how the Lord led me down this path for HIS Glory!  I am still on medication today, and will be for the rest of my life, because I have lived with this anxiety in my body for so long.  HOWEVER, that does not stop me from shouting from the rooftops that the Lord worked a mighty work in me, and still is.

My faith has intensified throughout this dark time in my life. 

I am now able to help others who are going through this same dark valley.  I am able to tell them my story, help them realize we are all human, and try to guide them with the Lord's help to what would be best for them.

Some of those people just needed to understand the Scripture more.

Some of those people needed medication just like me.

II Corinthians 1:3-4

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort;

who comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

This experience has taught me to be REAL with others.

It has taught me to have a compassion that I would not have had unless I walked this journey.

It has allowed me to use what happened to me to help others... not give pat phrases.

All for God's glory.

My blog name "Just Me" is so fitting and I am thankful for the Lord's guidance in that as well.  I want others to know I am on a journey and HUMAN just like them.  I am learning and growing just like everyone else.  We all have things that go wrong whether in our bodies or in life itself.  If in that process of my own learning and growing that I can help others, that is what the Lord calls me to do.

You're seeing "JUST ME."