2020 ended, and even with the "time" we were given I was not able to write as much as I would have wanted to here. I was even inspired by a friend to finally write my own book. My writing has been stunted because of my desire of not spewing more negativity into the world. I have been riding quite an emotional roller coaster this year.
I remember last year my husband and I had ranked 2019 in our top three worst years of our life and when we started listing all the things we were grateful for we felt quite ashamed of doing that. We had no idea what 2020 would bring! I feel inclined to feel defeated when one of the things I was grateful for last year was me getting over my PTSD, but this year it came back with a vengence. This is the main reason I have not wanted to "share" anything in my public corners of the internet. I wanted to write my victory post. I wanted to share my "aha" moments that stuck with me and got me out of this funk. And I did have those moments, but this is a recovery journey not a miracle awakening.
My counselor says I am very objective person. I see the problem at hand and list the steps necessary to overcome it. I saw my depression creeping back in, so I doubled my Bible reading time, my exercise time, and my gratitude lists. But life is not x + y = z, especially not our minds and souls. They are a mystery. They operate in mystery and are influenced by mystery. When none of my efforts kept my depression at bay, I fell into despair. "Why read the Bible if it is not helping how I feel? Why exercise if I only feel more crappy than before and everything aches anyways whether I exercise or not?"
I´ve been wanting to write about that counseling session I had because OH MY GOODNESS it was something else. In my objective mind I had made some things "truth": God had used my cancer for His glory when through it I was able to reach so many people and share the gospel. His will is good, pleasing, and perfect. God does things for the glory of His name, not for the good of people. He is sovereign. You might be reading this and wondering why I put "truth" in quotations when this is TRUTH. Well, if you only take some truths from God and not the whole truth, these truths become lies. Think of Jesus being tempted by Satan and Satan using scripture to tempt Jesus. The same thing was happening to me. Deep in my heart, I was believing terrible lies due to these truths. Lies I had allowed in my heart and needed to confess to overcome. I will be writing down the lies I was believing in parenthesis for you to understand my thought process.
Lie number 1: God gave me cancer.
"If He is sovereign, He gave me cancer. My cancer is genetic for crying out loud! It came written in my genes at the time of my conception. God´s plan for me was for me to get cancer!" Here things get tricky for me to explain it clearly because it requires an understanding of Theology I do not possess. I´m going to write it down in the layman terms I understand it. Jesus saves the sinner; He doesn't make the sinner sin. This is one of the most disputed aspects of predestination and sovereignty. His sovereignty is then defined in His choice not to exercise His authority over our sin (unleash His justice and wrath which no one would survive). This sovereignty of His is present in His mercy, grace, and love that is beyond our human comprehension. Some will not agree with me in this point but the answer is: No! God did not ordain cancer for my life. He allowed it: yes! He knew about it: Yes! He caused it: No!
James 1
16 Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. 17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, Who does not change like shifting shadows. 18 He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all He created.
See, I was believing the lie that He caused it. And so, my objective mind had never admitted many things my subjective heart was feeling: I was both angry with God and afraid of God. And thus my relationship with God has been a fear-bond: I am unwilling to trust Him because you cannot trust someone you fear, but I am too afraid to leave Him.
Lie number 2: His plan for me was cancer for His glory.
What a misconception of God was plaguing my heart! His plan for me was not cancer so He could get glory. He is able to somehow get glory from me in spite of me! He is not bringing forth things in my life for His name's glory. His name's glory is doing fine without me! That He is able to use my affliction for His glory is a mercy and a miracle, not the plan. How could I obey the Bible when it said: "Wait on the Lord! Do not be anxious! Trust the Lord!" when my heart was afraid that meant more hardship for His glory?!!! I was frightened.
And here is where confession played a part in my recovery. How had I allowed myself to be deceived on who the true God was! My mom would say to me "Hold tight to God's promises to you" and I would fret. I was deceived. I was lost.
This is His plan for me:
Ephesians 1 4 For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love 5 He predestined us for adoption to sonship[c] through Jesus Christ, in accordance with His pleasure and will— 6 to the praise of His glorious grace, which He has freely given us in the One He loves. 7 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace 8 that He lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, 9 He made known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Christ, 10 to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.
Lie number 3: He is a distant Father.
If my view of God is as Kind and Sovereign without the complete understanding of Who He is as a whole, my view of Him is flawed. I could no longet see my loving Father. As part of my counseling, I was asked to go back to the time in my life when I could hear His voice. I closed my eyes and prayed the Holy Spirit would make me recall the days my Father in Heaven was as real to me as my father on earth. I went back to the days I felt fatherless after the divorce of my parents and God's promise that “if my father and mother left me He would not” kept me going! I held tight to that promise and never felt alone. I would pour my heart to God all night and I would feel comforted, listened, and held. I began looking at God as my Father again.
One time I was trying to teach one of my students how to cut. She was getting frustrated because she didn't want to let her older sister teach her how to hold the scissors or the paper. She wanted to do it alone. She wanted to do it right. I had to ask her father to intervene. He came and held the paper to her. She had never cut straight lines before. Her attitude to cutting changed and she declared cutting was now her favorite thing. (For those who don't know, I teach preschool prep classes online). I told her father this was normal and I had struggled with the same attitudes with my girls, especially in their threenager years (three year olds that act like teenagers). It made me think of myself. I am struggling with depression and I want to do it alone and I want to get right at first try. And I thought of God, my father, lovingly trying to let me know I need to let Him teach me, hold my hand when I can't hold the scissor right yet, and have the patience of practicing to get it right. This filled my heart with joy and hope to feel I am not alone and I should not be defeated I am still learning to deal with my depression.
I spent the night in prayer after that counseling meeting. I hadn't talked to God like that in ages. It was so comforting and uplifting. I woke up the next morning feeling so different. The counselor was telling me about God's love for me. While he was telling me this I could hear a voice say "Yeah, God loves you and wants to spend time with you but you squander that love and time." I said this out loud and my counselor said words that have been life changing in this struggle: "God does not talk like that."
And so, everytime those voices have popped in my head I have let them now "The true God does not talk like that and I won't listen to any of that anymore!"
If you are struggling with your relationship with God, seek help, seek counseling! Stop thinking you can do it alone. You can't! Ask God to bring you back and help you hear His voice. He is calling with tender love. I will not be kept from dwelling in that love any longer, not by my ignorance, not by my fear, not by my anger.
Matthew 79 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! 12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. 13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
There is so much more I want to share of that counseling session, but this will do for now. And so, 2020 was a beating for so many, but I will begin 2021 by listing all the things I must be grateful for in 2020.
2. The most understanding girls ever. They suffered the quarantine. They shed tears. They consistently prayed for this to be over. But they kept their spirits up and their good attitudes throughout.
3. Mom's recovery. I won't say much of this, but it was more than I could ask for in terms of provision and protection.
4. A small birthday party in covid times. I am grateful nothing went "bad" in terms of anyone getting the virus or being a threat to others. We took a chance. I'm just glad it turned out ok and the girls got a much needed break from this reality.
5. Friends who stayed close, both far and close (though the quarantine made everyone feel far).
6. A solid family. I can't thank God more for my husband.
7. A renewed relationship with my mom and sister. Close quarters will do that.
8. A business opportunity for Lilly and me.
9. Everyone had good health.
10. We still have our house.
11. Girls had a good education year and kept learning gym and piano and more
12. We were still able to serve at Church
I am so sorry for those who lost loved ones to Covid or during 2020. I pray you have the hope of seeing them again through Christ. The Lord is near.
