Welcome to my blog! Once a month, I’m sharing both something I’ve newly written and one of my most-read posts from the past dozen years. Hope you enjoy! –Elisabeth

NEW POST: Circumstantially Depressed

If circumstances can make you dip into a depression in under seven days, I’m crawling back out of one. I had a handful of stressful things happen at once over the course of about two months, with three new things bringing everything to a crescendo within days. In the midst of it, one of the bad things – a health thing – kept me from my daily walk, which is a mental health lifeline for me.

And I found myself crying on and off and isolating and beyond sad.

I haven’t felt this way in years.

And this circumstantial depression has reminded me of a few things.

1. I don’t want to take for granted that for the most part, my life is good across the board right now. What a gift! For about 20 years, my life was mostly painful with some good things thrown in there. But now, these days, these past few years, my life is mostly good with some hard things now and then. Gift gift gift. And I need to be grateful grateful grateful. This has been a good reminder of all I’ve got.

2.  I was proud of myself for being gentle with myself through most of it. I wasn’t beating myself up for feeling the way I was feeling (which was overwhelmed and devastated, while my body fought an infection). Though I did write in my journal this morning, “I’m sorry for how I’ve been reacting to all of this,” I immediately felt the Spirit say to my heart, “You don’t need to be sorry”, which was such mercy.

3. I’ve been trying to keep taking care of myself in all the other ways, while also just letting myself be, and rest, and read, and lie on the couch; still smoothie-ing it up; still saying out loud how I’m feeling.

4. I’ve been honest with the LORD. I wrote this in my journal this morning:

I do not know what is going to happen with my body or with fill-in-the-blank this week.
But You know.
Increase my faith in Your love for me.
What I want is this: fill-in-the-blank and fill-in-the-blank.
What I may get is: well, not that.
Please help me be okay with whatever Your will is.
Walk me and us through this. Your will be done. I love You.

I sent this to my friend and her response was: “That is the prayer of a worried but surrendered woman.”

Yes, that’s me…def worried and trying to be surrendered as best as I can to things that I cannot control.

So, if this is you…if you find yourself in either an actual depression that’s been lasting a while or a seasonal/circumstantial depression, please know that you are not alone. Please know that it’s normal for more than one hard thing to pile on at a time, as quote-unquote unfair as that sounds.

Please share your feelings with God. He is with you and he loves you and he cares.
Please reach out and tell someone. Say the hard things out loud.
Please try to do things that nurture your body and mind and heart, whatever those things are for you.

You’re not alone and you are loved.

 

REPOST: No Comfort from God

Several years ago I found myself in the middle of the worst (up to that point) and longest crisis of my life.  Something swept into my sweet little life and set up camp for 441 days (but who’s counting).  And in the middle of all that, two of my best friends moved away.

To say I was sad does not even begin to cover it.  This chain of events broke parts of my heart off.

And in that pain and depression and darkness and stress and fear, I did not feel God’s peace and I did not feel God’s presence.

This stunned me as I had been under the impression in the twenty years or so prior as a Christ-follower that I would have access to God’s unsurpassing peace when I needed it.

During that time, I was with a dear friend.  And I said something to her that I’d never said to anyone else before.  And I said it in a whisper as if she’d possibly disown me or Jesus would strike me down.

I said, “In all my years of following Jesus, I have to admit that I have not felt the comfort of God in my life and hard circumstances more than I have felt the comfort of God.”  Then I winced.

And she said, “Oh yeah, totally.”

Alrighty then.

Here’s what I know though.

God promises peace.  He never says in Scripture how that peace will manifest.  We, as humans, are probably looking for it to pan out in certain ways, like a fixed circumstance to our liking or at the very least, some kind of feeling or steadiness that comes over us.  I’ve felt that. But then again, I’ve not felt it more than I have felt it.

God promises his presence. He’s not going anywhere. He is never, ever leaving you. No matter how it feels or what you do or don’t do.

I also know this: the times I have felt something…..that unexplainable peace, that tangible Presence of the Most High…..those times have gotten me through the times that I haven’t.

And I know this: faith is not about feelings or what we can touch or see. It’s about believing in Something bigger than yourself, Something that has shown himself faithful and true and good.

I may not feel comfort in the ways that I want to feel it from God.  But I rest in my faith that it’s there and he’s there and he’s not leaving my side.

For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. -2 Corinthians 1:5

 

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