I've recently been struggling to keep my spirits out of the dump. That's no explanation as to my absence here because I've had several things I've wanted to post. But, when I find myself in this place of BLAH, I am unmotivated to even do the things I love.
My negative emotional state has caused me to examine and re-examine just who I'm believing. Have you ever been told not to pray for patience? My most recent Bible study, Believing God by Beth Moore, has had similar repercussions. Beth challenges the student to believe 1) God is who He says He is. 2) God can do what He says He can do. 3) I am who God says I am. 4) I can do all things through Christ. 5) God's word is alive and active in me. Let me just say that after 3 weeks, God is still working in me to get me to believe with everything I am that He truly is who He says He is and He can do what He says He can do.
When I began my first week of homework, I prayed, "I want to learn from this study, but it just seems like wrote learning. Make it mean something. Grow it inside me and use it to transform me." And did He ever answer! Just like a prayer for patience, He's begun to test me. Testing to see just what do I believe. Here I am in a place where I typically struggle to hear God's voice over the shouts of the enemy. A place where my feelings are the opposite of His Truth to me. A place reminescent of defeat. A place I call depression.
I continue to seek God and repeat His Word to myself in this time, in this place, but it is difficult to really believe. Verses that stuck in my head seemed to be speaking the opposite of what I was experiencing. Part of me could identify with Abraham who "at about 100 years of age... figured his body was as good as dead - and so was Sarah's womb" yet, God had told him, "I will make you the father of many nations." (Romans 4:19, 17) It was the same for me. My current life circumstances were quite contrary to His Truth. I read in Hosea 6: 1-3, "Come let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces, now he will heal us. He has injured us; now he will bandage our wounds. In just a short time he will restore us, so that we may live in his presence. Oh that we might know the Lord! Let us press on to know him. He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of dawn or the coming of rains in early spring." After reading this passage, as I was readying myself one morning, I heard Him say, "I will heal you! Do you believe that I can?" I wanted to believe He was going to heal me of this depression, that He meant it to be a permanent healing, but thought more practically and reasoned that my feelings, opposite of this Truth, were much more believable.
I continued to combat this yuckiness while God continued asking, "Do you believe that I can heal you?" I wanted to believe He could, but the bondage depression kept my mind and emotional state in seemed much more real.
Continuing to participate in the only thing that I knew could save me from myself, I stayed in the Word. I began Romans and came to chapter 4 verse 17, "...Abraham believed in the God who brings the dead back to life..." I was trudging through merely practicing ritual, but knew something about this verse hit deep within me. I sensed God was asking me to believe that if He could bring the dead back to life He could therefore easily heal me of this depression. Well, I believe He can raise the dead. Just look at Jesus... and even Lazarus, and numerous other people throughout the Bible. So, what was He getting at?
Carrying around this unfinished work of His inside me for days, I muddled through. Easter Sunday arrived and I spent the sunrise with Him, alone. I read in Romans 4 again and noticed verse 18, "For God had said to him..." Abraham did not have the Scriptures to consult to confirm his belief. He was experiencing (his old age) the opposite of what God was promising, yet he believed because God had said it to him. God had told me that He would heal me of this yucky state and I prayed, "Oh how I want to believe just because you speak it to me. 'I do believe, but help me overcome my unbelief.' (Mark 9:24) I want faith like Abraham..."
At church that same Easter day, we sang a revved up version of Jesus Paid It All by Kristian Stanfill. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onxhvivQYfI) I was just going with the flow singing an old hymn I hadn't sung in a while when the band kicked it up a notch and the words sounded similar to Romans 4:17. We sang, "Oh praise the One who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead." I began to sob uncontrollably because it was then I heard what He was trying to say. "Cara, I have given you 'new life in Christ.' But, this all sticks with you because I raise the dead, literally. I raised you from the dead that lonesome night so long ago. It was my power alone that raised your dead life that night. Believe me! Believe my words to you! Believe my power to do what I promise! 'Be fully persuaded that what [I] promise, [I] am able also to perform. (Romans 4:21 KJV)... Believe me!"
You see, at the age of 13 or 14, I spent a dreary night in what seemed like an endless depressive state and took every Tylenol, Nuprin, Motrin in our house until I gagged because I could swallow no more. I went to bed telling no one. Because of newly discovered facts due to a family member's recent suicide attempt, I now know that medically, I should have died from liver and other organ failure. But, instead He rid me of everything I had taken. He was the only One who knew and He saved me from dying that lonely night.
You see, I saw my survival as yet another thing I was not good enough at. I couldn't even kill myself. I lived after that attempt believing that my body simply rejected all I had ingested just as my dog's body does when she eats too many socks. I did not realize He performed a miracle in my life until April 12, 2009.
Healing of my depression did not occur in the miraculous revelation of that moment, but do I know He will do it? Listen to Him tell you, "Now Cara, share this! 'Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His faithful love endures forever. Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies.' (Psalm 107:1-2) Now this depressive state will no longer have it's hold on you. Now confess this unbelief to others... 'Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.' (James 5:16)"
Believe Him? You bet I do! Know that He has given me grace to share because we have argued over Him telling me to write this for a few weeks. But, sharing my weaknesses, faults, trials, mistakes, sins, is what will bring me healing. Obedience to His voice and believing Him is a life lived in freedom and abundance.
The miraculous has not been wasted on me!! His purposes for denying my cries that night are far greater than I could have ever imagined. Glory to His name! Amen and Amen!
