Serving Rascals, Clumsy Disciples, and Physically and Mentally Ill Believers with the Unconditional Love of Jesus Christ
“I’m must show myself; things are not going well, to be honest. I’m becoming more and more fragmented. And I can’t seem to hold it together. Essentially, I mentally can’t keep it centered on the things I know are right and appropriate. My mind is in a muddle, and my heart is not far behind.
I can’t go on like this. I have to confess that I’m spinning out of control. There are too many issues that hammer me, without any resolution or finality. I need a “booster shot” of grace. (Perhaps, maybe an I.V. would be better.)
All I want is to escape, and to shake off these ‘parasites’ that sap me of any strength I might generate. Far too many things are draining me of any vitality and hope. Despair and despondency have suddenly shown up at my door, but I treat them as unwelcomed visitors, and hope they will leave me alone. All they want to do is take me apart, and dismantle me, and I seldom advance beyond this. I haven’t invited them.
This simple blog has kept me going. The posts that I write are sincere, and I know for a fact they touch many hearts. I’m astonishingly grateful for this. But they can’t minimize my own issues. I am constantly on the edge, a step one way or another could push into a desperate fall. (Funny, I’m starting to scare myself.)
I have a deep confidence in Jesus. I believe that he loves me in the most intense way possible. I trust in his deliberate and careful love. Resting in his arms is the very best thing I could do. He is the only one who can lead me through my mental illness. Or to give me the grace to move above it.
I do not want to offend or alienate anyone. That simply is not what I am about. But I simply can not try to take Brokenbelievers much further in this ‘frame of mind.’ I will try to post as often as I can– but both my therapist and psychiatrist want me to go into a hospital. I have already been there several times and I do not want to be admitted any time soon.
The next several days should be interesting. I’m definitely committed to avoiding hospitalization. The “professionals” I trust are trying to commit me, but I do intend to make a scrap of it. “I will not go lightly.”
Please try to be patient with me. I want to post, it runs through my veins. But I simply don’ t have the resources that extend into transparency and clarity. Please forgive me. There’s is no way I can make this work without avoiding a “shutdown.” We will see.
***
(Lord, have mercy on us.)
“Let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water.”
Hebrews 10:22
I have never really understood “caving”. Some consider it a sport, but I guess I really don’t see the athleticism of it. People actually seem to derive some satisfaction and thrill from exploring muddy caves in the dark. I guess I can try to grab the basic idea of it, but to me it’s a whole lot like “parachuting”. Why jump out of a perfectly decent airplane, when you can sit in a Starbucks with a vanilla latte? It doesn’t compute.
But there is a sense about caving that resonates with the hunger in a man’s or woman’s heart. Hebrews tell us that we are to enter the presence of God. The keys will be sincerity and trust. In other words, a honesty, and a trust that will open up the passage. Spiritual spelunkers in a quest for His glor
y.
Sometimes something will block a person. Depression is a barrier for us. Essentially it effects our passion and strength. Our pursuit of God is nullified by the corrosive facets of depression and melancholy. There is no longer any zip or zeal for His presence. The fire of zeal we once had just fizzles out. But to reach our goal, we need to squeeze beyond the blockage. There is a spiritual resistance. Our infernal enemy is working against any progress.
So much involves patience and humility. A person must continue to probe ahead but slowly and patiently, taking their time and monitoring their progress. Humility is necessary. An awareness of self and our dimensions in tight spots. “Am I small enough to squeeze through that hole?”
Our scripture tells us that we have a key to the throne room of God. Our guiltiness and our defiled conscience have both been cleansed or sanitized from anything that would corrupt us. We haven’t done a thing. And we are exhorted to be very bold. Jesus has made us pure. We are clean.
I gre
w up in a big, brick house in Northern Wisconsin. Our beautiful home hid our desperate poverty, and it was quite difficult. My father and mother scraped by enough each week to feed and clothe us. But just barely. Mom would take some elbow macaroni, and mix it with stewed tomatoes (from a dwindling supply she tried to manage.)
I was oblivious to our precarious situation. I carried a plain peanut butter
sandwich to school for years, but I had a simple dream of getting “hot lunch.” I was tired of peanut butter, as I watched all the other kids eat pizza, hamburgers and (my fav. mashed potatoes with a pat of butter.) I ate PB for several years. You could stucco a house with what I ate.
I wasn’t really settled in my heart or thinking. I developed into a bipolar childhood that had quite a bit of depression, and a load of impulsivity. I was an impossible child, and I was out-of-control. I was either terribly manic or profoundly depressed. My Mom and Dad simply didn’t know or grasp my mental illness and how it was effecting me.
A repeated nightmare worked its claws into my thinking. I would wake up sobbing, almost inconsolable. I had this dream several times in my teens, and can still 40 years later taste the panic. In this dream, I would be lifted up and laid on a slow conveyor belt. I would be on my back, and I would see over my feet a giant roller. This roller had big nobs on it and it was rolling over what the conveyor belt brought to it. In this dream I was paralyzed, unable to escape this giant crushing roller. I kept fighting, and trying to escape. But, I was completely frozen.
I would waken just as my feet met the roller. The fear I had was as intense as any I ever had. (Except when I had to go down to the basement, but that was more reasonable.) I would repeat this dream several times, and it was always the same. I haven’t had this dream for 30 years or more, but it still has a potency and fear to make me edgy.
Over the many years I have thought about this. I certainly don’t want to mysticize it, or try to force an interpretation out of it. But it has struck me as a metaphor of my life to some degree. In this dream I was moving toward an inevitable crushing. The paralyzing panic was a fair description of where I was at spiritually.
This explanation may sound childish and simplistic. But it is so workable, and brings a certain comprehension to these terrible moments of fear. And our dreams, well, they are funny things. All of us, somehow, and in some strange fashion are treated to a surrealistic and fantastical mini-story as we sleep. But what does it mean?
Much of the time, upon awakening, we try to piece together both the chronology and the meaning of what we had just dreamed. It’s hard to do, most of the time it justs slips away. Yet, our inner heart always wonders if that particular dream was “good, bad or ugly.” There are rare times when we can grab on a sequence of events, and relay it to a close friend.
Some things will never be revealed in this lifetime. But I believe there are certain things in our dreams that the Holy Spirit chooses to bring to light. We are never sanctioned to seek the meaning of our dreams, but only the Lord Himself. We should never lean on our understanding, but on our Father and His Word.
P.S. I realize in writing this, I don’t like peanut butter at all.
