White Flags

True joy is something that was really hard for me to grasp. It used to be a common thing for me to cry anytime I got slightly emotional about God. There were so many things that made me cry and it seemed like I spent the past 8 years crying to make up for the years of no tears I experienced before I knew Christ.

Passion was different this year. It was a breaking point. I didn't break down this year, I didn't cry over and over, I did something so completely different than what I'm used to … My face broke into a smile again and again and again. :) I smiled so much, I can hardly believe it now a month later. I found something this year. I found joy.

Depression is one of those complicated things that is so deeply rooted in a person's thoughts and emotion, and it even takes a physical tole. I remember the time I lost 8 lbs in one week because I was so depressed I couldn't eat. I also remember the one time I turned to cutting just to feel something because I was so desperate to feel. I remember crying myself to sleep just because I felt so useless and stupid and unwanted and ugly. I remember quite a lot, and I've experienced quite a lot. I've suffered from depression for right around 10 years. Moving to Alabama was the catalyst. I think that quite literally it started with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I remember 7th grade in this way: every single day was a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day. Moving to a new place for me was like being ripped from this beautiful fairy-tale of a childhood with few bad days, and many amazing friends and shoved into a group of cold-hearted southern bumpkins that found way too much amusement in calling me fat and making me feel stupid. (Disclaimer = Paige Cochran was my hero in middle school. She was my best friend, and she was I think the only person I never felt judged by all the way through middle school, and it was pretty much the best part of my entire middle school career).

Along with all that, I want to say this: being a follower of Christ is a journey. It's a constant turning over of yourself to God, and it's allowing the Holy Spirit to point out your flaws and your sin, then giving you the opportunity to surrender those things to God. My life has never been perfect if you just look at me, and it never will be. I'm flawed even where I don't see it. The thing is, I'm learning. Always learning, always finding flaws and seeing where I'm not surrendering different areas of my life to God. So, these past 10 years of depression haven't gone without growth. Slowly God has revealed hope and several other things. Being a follower of Christ is such a thick and deep subject, so I'm going to skim on a lot and jump to the big deal that happened at Passion this year.

So, back to depression. A lot of my depression was fueled by doubt. I didn't think that I was worth anyone's love. I didn't think I was worth it to a lot my friends, I didn't think I was worth a second glance from any guys, I didn't think I was smart enough to make it in any kind of career, I didn't think I was worth investing in, I didn't think I was worth being discipled by older believers, I didn't think I was worth much of anything. I knew I wasn't helpless and I knew I had things to contribute to the world, but it really comes down to me not thinking that I was someone worth having a personal relationship with. All of those thoughts and beliefs made me doubtful of myself time and time again. I didn't find a lot of joy in much of anything (except Lord of the Rings… I will forever find joy in how God speaks to me through Tolkien).

At Passion, the theme was freedom. The whole conference was centered around setting slaves free from bondage. It was there that I realized I wasn't just doubtful, but I was enslaved to doubt. It controlled my actions. It kept me from pursing friendships, and all kinds of relationships - be it with friends, family, girls, guys, adults, or kids. I was trapped in a lie and the 'great deceiver,' Satan, had me convinced of all of these ridiculous beliefs about myself. I'm not perfect, and I'm not God, but I love my friends dearly. I love some of my friends so much it hurts. I let people run over me because I just want them to know that God loves them no matter what. I know some of my friends are constantly hurting, and that's why some of them hurt me, but I just want them to see how inexplicably awesome God's healing is. I also seem to have a knack for story telling. I learned how to write well after I became a Christian, so I really think it is a gift. It's not because I'm awesome, but God has given me a gift to seek stories and write stories. I hid these gifts a lot in college because I was constantly distracted and doubted the gift I was given. There are more things I no longer doubt, because God has blessed me with a lot of things I thought were untrue about myself.

At Passion we sang a song called, "White Flag." The chorus went like this, "We raise our white flag, we surrender all to you, all for you. We raise our white flag, the war is over, love has come, your love has won." During the conference I realized my enslavement to doubt and I realized that fighting with doubt wasn't my battle. For so long I tried so hard to be a good Christian. I tried to fight off doubt because I know that my depression wasn't righteous and it wasn't how I needed to live if I wanted to be all God wanted me to be. I never turned to meds or a shrink. I knew if I just ate right and exercised my seretonan (sp?) levels and whatnot would normalize to what they should be, or they'd at least get close. I was too lazy to eat right and exercise, so I wasn't going to turn to medicine because in my heart I felt like that was just an easy way out/ excuse to whine. Now, I did visit the doctor when I had unusual depression that wasn't the norm for me and I gained a lot of weight in 4 months without changing anything. Turns out my thyroid isn't working up to par (which runs in my family, so). As far as a shrink goes… well… I've needed to get a Christian mentor for quite a while, so I'm looking into that now. I wasn't interested in a typical shrink because I knew that someone that wasn't a Christian wasn't going to give me the help I truly needed. I don't suggest ignoring help to anyone, but I was too afraid to admit to any adults that I had a problem. Only a few of my closest friends knew I was struggling, and I'm not really sure how much I even let them know.

So back to Passion (sorry, I think backstory is important): I struggled with wanting to be a good Christian and I thought that I should just be one and that I shouldn't struggle as much as I did. In a sense, I was right in my thinking. I shouldn't have struggled that much, I should have just given my struggles to Christ. That was the thing that hit home at Passion: Christ has already won the battle. He has defeated sin and He is the one that has conquered Satan and is waiting to end the war. I was fighting my battle against depression mostly alone because I thought that was my lot in life. Boy, oh boy was I wrong. All I had to do was raise my white flag and say, "God!! I can't fight Satan!! He's too big for me and too strong! Help me, please! Here, take this depression and doubt and start beating the crap out of it, please!" And guess what? He did! Knowing that I didn't have to fight this personal battle made my shoulders so much lighter! I was so free! I was free to worship with all of my heart, and sing without caring what people thought of my voice, free to smile as big as I wanted, free to be so incredibly happy that God made me Me.

I realized again that God loves me. Not because I deserve it (the Lord knows that I certainly don't deserve it with my past). He loves me because He's awesome like that. He wants me to be free to love Him back, and that's what I found at Passion 2012. Freedom to love God without feeling so unworthy. It's a weird knowledge to explain, because I know I'm unworthy, but I don't feel unworthy. I just feel really loved.

Now I'm not only free to love God unashamedly, but I'm free to love others too. :) That's a big part of my life now. I'm not sure quite how this will appear in my life, because I already loved people before, but I think it was more in my heart and not really as evident as I would like it to be. So, yesterday I played with toddlers and picked up a bouncy ball that fell into an already used kiddie toilet bowl. Yep, that sounds disgusting and I could've spent my entire morning freaking out about how completely unsanitary those little kids were, but whatever. They were adorable and they CRAVED love. The first thing they did when I entered the building was run and hug my legs. It was an adjustment for sure, but I just got over it. That was a moment where I know God's love for me freed me to love others. Also, I stayed with two really awesome girls while I was in Botswana. I lived in their house for two days, and there were several things that I know would have bothered me had I visited their house last December, BUT this January I was free :) Now I just remember having a great two days of experiencing a different culture's lifestyle. I remember seeing beautiful farm land, going to a very different church service than what I typically experience at home, having awesome conversation with two really great university aged girls (my new friends!), having fun learning how to wash clothes the Botswana day, and just enjoying life. It was almost weird enjoying life like that, but it was mostly just enjoyable :)

Am I still depressed? Nope. Just no. That's not Me anymore. I'm just done with that, because now I know that's something I have to surrender to God whenever it presents itself. It's really that simple.

I waited a month before posting this because I wanted to make sure I could still say all that with the same conviction I experienced at the beginning of Passion. Life isn't easy, but it's never been easy. Flying 17 hours away from my family and friends wasn't easy, but it's what God wanted me to do, so He's made life joyful because of my obedience.

I don't know who is reading this or where you are in life, but I can assure you that I've known so many depressed people in my life. There were several years where I couldn't have told you anything as true as this: depression doesn't have to claim your life. God loves you. Satan is the one making your life miserable (and I'm being honest here: your own stubbornness is part of the equation as well, just as my stubbornness was). God wants to set you free. He wants you to proclaim His Son as your Savior (google John 3 and look specifically at verses 16-18), and He wants you to seek Him. That's what my life is now. I just want to seek Him always, love Him, and love others. What more could you want from life than true love? Seek and you will find.

So… seek, surrender, love, be FREE.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11