We accept pain (sadness, depression, anxiety, hopelessness, worthlessness) as though it is “too bad, so sad. You’ll always have this in your life”.
When I hear this I rage inside. NO! That is not what God says He has for us.
There is a reason why we think these things. It’s because we accept them as truth. We make a decision that this is just how it is and always will be.
But, that is just not true!
This last week I heard two stories with the same theme. Both ladies told stories of sadness that they have come to accept as something that will always be with them. Sure they have moments of joy, but there is always a lingering place inside of them where the sadness lives. Both ladies told their stories by describing the moments in which they decided to come to a place of acceptance about their sadness. I think they were trying to be encouraging by letting others know it’s ok to accept yourself as you are. While I agree with that to some degree, I do not agree that scripture supports God leaving us in despair. And I did not feel encouraged. I felt sad and hopeless.
Now, I have had my share of depression and anxiety. And you can argue that I don’t know the depth of your despair or the torment you have gone through, and you’d be right. I don’t know what it was like for you and I respect that. Period. BUT I cannot, knowing God’s word, believe that despair is what He has for us. It goes against everything His word says.
This may upset some people and if you are one of them, then I challenge you to explore why. Some people hold on to and protect their despair (maybe not knowingly). It’s as though letting it go or daring to believe that you can be free from it is unavailable to you. Sometimes it becomes so much a part of you that if you were to let it go, you function as though you’d be losing parts of yourself. Or you subconsciously believe that letting it go would mean that what happened to you was ok. But what happened to you was not ok and can coexist with a healed and whole heart restored by our Loving Heavenly Father!
2 Corinthians 3:18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is Spirit
Romans 15:13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
Romans 12:2 Rejoice in hope, patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.
Galatians 6:9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.
The trials we face can produce perseverance which results in hope (Rom 5:3-5). And while it is true that God’s word says in this life we will have trouble (John 16:33), the scripture passage does not end there or even begin there for that matter. You see God warns us about the troubles of this world so that we will prepare with his armor not surrender in defeat! According to John 16:33 God is bigger than our troubles and calls us to prepare so that we can have peace not despair.
If you decide that despair, depression, anxiety is what God has for you then the game is over. There is no fixing it or changing it. You are a victim to it. It’s only when you make the choice to believe that God does not have those things for you that He will begin to change your heart.
When it has been your companion for so long and it is all you have known, then it can be far scarier to have hope that God could or would or might do something about it. But to go all in and trust that He WILL do something about it is beyond what you can imagine. I understand that. And what I know about God is that He rarely makes you jump in the deep end. He can gradually help you let go of the grip you have on the belief that it will always be this way. But you have to turn toward Him and give him a mustard seed of faith that He can and will change you tears into joy.
Feed the hope. Do not feed the doubt. It’s ok to move forward in hope even if you have some doubt. Put the doubt in a suitcase, tell it that you know it’s there but you are choosing to go forward in/with Hope instead. Soon, God will help you leave that suitcase of doubt behind. And when that suitcase shows up again, you’ll simple acknowledge it, “I see you” and keep moving toward God’s truth, “but you don’t win this because you don’t know who my God is”.
So, believe and stand firm in truth! Don’t believe, buy into and settle on lies. KNOW SCRIPTURE so that when satan tells you a lie you can reject it with a very firm and intense, “NO! THAT IS NOT TRUTH! And I don’t care how long it takes, how bad it hurts or what I have to do to get to that truth, which is JOY, I will trust God to lead me to that because I accept nothing less than the truth of what God has for me”!
If you are ready to learn what God has for you, then I have a gift for you! If you fill out the form below, I will email you a pdf document entitled “What does God have for me”? Use these scripture verses as a Bible study, as journal topics or discussions to have with God. Then, please reach out to share with us how God is changing your heart as you let go of lies and stand firm in His truth! Join us in the free Facebook group Christian Divorce Recovery for Women or email me at Linda@healingyourhope.com.