25. God’s warriors

(artist unknown)

Last night, the Lord lay on my heart to pray for those who walk alone. Perhaps it is a physical aloneness but perhaps it is the emotional and mental aloneness. For me, surrounded by loved ones yet feeling completely and totally alone was (and is) the hardest place to walk. 

I was a trauma victim. But something that really caught my attention early on was how quickly the world wanted me to believe there was something wrong with me- by painting the picture of an unavoidable fate of depression in the most loving way imaginable. “It’s not your fault. You didn’t do this to yourself. You can’t help it. This is just part of it.”

It was as if depression was being handed to me on a silver platter before I even walked out of the doors of the hospital. I heard more about the depression I would surely face than I did the actual details of my illness. For months on end every healthcare provider I came in contact with warned me I would be depressed, inviting me to fill out forms at every visit to see where I ranked on the depression scale. I heard commercial after commercial for medication being offered as if it were candy to children. I noticed just how much depression and the mention of hides around every corner. Many friends and family reached out (some without even knowing the details of what I was going through-only knowing I was sick) with concern to warn me of the likelihood I would be depressed and struggling over the coming months. Perhaps they had experience in knowing and understanding what that looked like: for themselves or a loved one. I know the doctors were just doing their jobs and I do not believe anyone was being harmful on purpose and many were reaching out with good intentions and a genuine amount of concern because of how much these things have taken over homes and lives today, causing much devastation. But more often than not, I found little comfort in the well intended warnings and seemingly strange invitation to let depression in as part of my new “normal”. Instead, I found myself on my knees renouncing the call of depression over my life- again and again.

I am not someone who will ever tell you emotions are easy. I am not someone who will ever tell you to pretend like everything is ok and all you have to do is look on the bright side. I won’t even tell you I have an easy solution. I hit some dark times over my life-especially over this last year. After sepsis, I walked through the medical definition of PTSD, anxiety and depression according the world’s definition. I am someone who laid in bed with no will or desire to get up-wondering what kind of mom I was that would rather sleep the day away instead of see her beautiful children. I looked at my life I got to come home to and could see the amazing things that lay in front of me but I could feel no joy. I have heard the evil whisper in my ear suggesting that I would one day commit suicide because it would just be too much to handle. The hopelessness of even trying. The fear of failing. The devastation my physical body was going through. The sadness I felt I was bringing to others around me. The flashbacks, dreams and triggers that hit out of nowhere. The downward spiral I felt I had no control of….This stuff is no joke. I’m not saying that PTSD, anxiety and depression don’t exist. But friends, believe me, it isn’t from God. Yes, by medical standards I was diagnosed on paper but I knew by my walk in faith this was not the diagnoses God had for me. 

My therapist pointed out that those who are active in their faith statistically have a “easier” time recovering from a trauma, or walking through anxiety and depression. And as he said that to me, my heart felt like it was being ripped to pieces. I knew what I was walking through and if that was an “easier time” I couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around the people who were walking through theirs without Christ. 

So if you are someone who is struggling with any or all (or more) of those things whether you have a relationship with Jesus or not, here is my message to you: I am not telling you that you shouldn’t feel the way you do. And if you are seeing a doctor or counselor, taking medication or other, please do not hear me wrong: I am NOT calling for you to abandon any of those things. But what I am telling you is that YOU ARE NOT WEAK. What I am telling you is THERE IS HOPE. In my darkest moments the only way I can tell you I walked through it even with the help of others, was by the power of the Lord Jesus Christ-one (sometimes grueling) step at a time. The chain of depression is the enemy’s way of keeping one of God’s warriors in prison. 

You are one of God’s warriors. 

YOU ARE VALUABLE. 

YOU ARE LOVED. 

JESUS SEES YOU. 

And He wants to help you. No one can create your life with Jesus for you, but YOU have the power within you to begin your walk with Him. 

Lord Jesus,
You hear your children cry to you. You see your children when they try to hide their tears. No part of our hearts go unnoticed by you. I invite you into the rooms and hearts reading this today Lord. I pray your Spirit is felt by anyone present. The saturation of your love is full and deep and pure. Speak truth into the hearts and minds reading this Lord. Truth about who they are. Silence the voice of the enemy in the name of Jesus. Let us renounce the call of bondage over our lives that the world is so willing to tell us we will walk in. Trauma has no hold on us and I pray we all begin to walk in the freedom you died for. I break any chains of depression off in Jesus name. I break the chains of anxiety in Jesus name. I break any chains of PTSD in Jesus name. Fill us with your truth! May we turn to you instead of away from you, knowing that it is you and you alone that will break the chains that keep us in bondage. No human, no doctor, no expert is capable of doing that. We thank you so much for putting people in our lives to help us through times that are hard. Give us courage to not hide from that help but take one step at a time as we trust you a little more each day. May your words of truth take root in our hearts, and anything else wither and die as it falls at our feet. We need you now Lord, show us where to begin. Show us where to go next and may our eyes always be open to see you.
By the authority and power of Jesus Name-AMEN