Resilient and Redeemed: Lessons About Faith, Depression & SuicidalityShembull

Meeting Jesus

In a moment of total despair, I cried out to the God I didn’t even believe in. “If you’re real, God—whoever you are—you have seven days to show me or I’m going to end my life. I don’t see the reason to go on, so you better get to work. I’m not kidding. Seven days, or else. Amen, I guess.” I had turned fifteen a few months prior, so some part of this was teenage dramatics, but some of it pointed to deeper problems. I felt overwhelmed by my life, and I needed something to change.

On day six after my plea for God to show up, my next-door neighbor whom I’d never spoken to knocked on my front door and invited me to her birthday party right then. I told her I didn’t have time to come to her party. She peeked around me and said, “I think your Nintendo won’t miss you if you stop by for an hour or so.” I told her I didn’t have a present, and she countered that she didn’t need one from me. I eventually followed her back to her party with a bunch of strangers. Every single person I met overwhelmed me with kindness and genuine interest in me, to the degree that I said to someone, “I’m sort of a jerk. Why are you being so nice to me?” They replied that their kindness came from Jesus and that I should come with them to church the next day to learn more. Mostly because I hadn’t explored Christianity yet and knew time was short on my bargain with God, I agreed to show up. This decision changed my life.

The youth pastor talked about Romans 8, and he ended with a powerful promise: “Nothing can separate any of you from the love of God in Christ Jesus, but only if you are in Christ Jesus. If you aren’t in Christ, then the love of God isn’t for you yet. It can be, but it’s not activated yet.” While he spoke about the love of God, my spirit burned inside me. I went up and talked to the youth pastor, and he shared the good news of the gospel with me. He asked me if I wanted that friendship, and I almost leaped out of my skin saying yes. At that moment, I prayed a prayer of salvation, and I can honestly tell you my life has never been the same. For a season, my depression and suicidality even lifted in the joy of my new spiritual life. It would return, but for a few years, I had the joy of being free from these burdens and felt the joy of growing and learning more about God.

I learned that God will go to any lengths to draw someone to himself. In the eyes of most, I wouldn’t even have been worth saving. I sometimes acted like an angry young man then, dissatisfied with the world, and I was literally a day away from my last day on earth. Yet God looked from the heavens and said, “I love that one and want to rescue him from his dark pit.”

He says the same thing to you. Regardless of any mental health condition or status, when God looks at you from the heavens, he has nothing but love in his eyes.

Do you believe that God is as invested in demonstrating his love to you in your life? Why or why not?

Note: If this finds you in a mental health crisis, please dial 9-8-8, the mental health helpline.

Please don’t let another second go by without getting in touch with someone who cares about life moving forward for you.