Trigger warning: This post contains content around the topic of depression, and suicide.
A few months ago, I heard a sermon by Pastor Katy Kazadi titled “Nevertheless Noah,” and the opening was something I would never forget. It’s been a topic that kept coming up, and usually, I would just pray and ask the Lord to have mercy. But after listening to the opening of this message, something in me stirred.
You see, Pastor Katy shared that there was a woman in her congregation who showed up every day. She was a member of their church—not very active, but she made herself visible to the pastor. The pastor ended up forming a mentoring relationship with her, as she was a younger woman. As time went on, because Pastor Katy was intentional with this young woman, she noticed that the light in her eyes began to dim. Something was wrong.
Later, Pastor Katy sadly learned that the young woman had tragically taken her own life.
I paused the message and began to cry. The pastor continued to urge us to have a sense of urgency in all that we do, just like Noah did, because time runs out. We need to lead people to Jesus and to the freedom He brings.
The weeks kept flying by, and of course, this topic kept coming up in different spaces. The Lord even placed specific people on my heart to call who were struggling with depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts. I, myself, went through a period where I felt like if I didn’t pick up the phone and call some of my church leaders, family, and friends, it could have taken me down with it.
Weeks went by, and the topic kept coming up.
As I prayed over Camp Hem and asked God what the theme should be, I heard Him say, “Tell My daughters I want them to live.”
I grew up in a home clouded by depression.
When I met my now-husband, I remember him asking me what it was like at home. I would tell him that my favorite moments were when I was outside of the house. Mostly at church, because we grew up Pentecostal and were at church Monday–Sunday most days. Or, it was being outside rollerblading, riding my bike, catching fireflies, being a prankster, and jumping fences.
But depression was really real in my home. I just didn’t know that was what I was being exposed to or dealing with.
I remember being young, maybe 8 or 9, and thinking back to the preachings at church and wondering, “Is what I am experiencing here the darkness they’re talking about?”
It was hard to know, though, because my mom wasn’t doing the usual things they would call out in church as a struggle or a sin, you know?
She was literally a woman who would go to church every chance she got. I often saw her reading her Bible or praying, and yet there was this thing that wouldn’t let her go.
This sadness that wouldn’t let her go.
There was this thing that would cause her to turn into a different person.
She wouldn’t shower. She wouldn’t eat. Sometimes, she wouldn’t even get out of bed. On most nights, she would cry in the dark, and I would have school the next day. I remember asking her if she could go to sleep because her crying was keeping me up at night.
That thing would not let her go, and it ruined her life.
It made her isolate herself and lose connection with family.
It made her lose her husband.
She has lived a life of being stuck.
Stuck in anger. Stuck in heartache. Stuck.
Eventually, her depression got so bad that I knew it was the grace of God that kept her alive.
Her depression would make her violent. It would make her believe that she wasn’t loved or needed in this world. It took hold of her entire mind.
As a child, it was very hard for me to witness that, especially as a Christian. I noticed that my mom would be one way in church, but at home, she was drowned in sorrow.
How can it be that a woman of God, who has decided to give her life and dedicate her life to the Lord, live like this?
According to the national library of medicine “Women experience depression at higher rates than men. Women are about 70% more likely than men to experience depression over their lifetime.”
If you are someone who is currently struggling with depression, anxiety, and/or suicidal thoughts, I want you to know that the enemy has a target on your back because of your identity as His daughter. And today is the day that I believe and declare that it ends—that it breaks off of you.
You are not less of a Christian because you struggle with this. In fact, this was common even in the Bible. Some of the most significant leaders and people of faith in Scripture also wrestled with these very feelings.
Elijah literally asked God to take his life in 1 Kings 19. King David often wrote in the Psalms about his soul being downcast. Job experienced unimaginable grief and suffering. Hannah, in the depths of her anguish, sought the Lord, and Scripture tells us that she was “deeply troubled.”
What was another thing all of these people had in common?
They sought the Lord.
They fought for freedom. They drew near to Him. They brought their pain into His presence.
And today, Jesus wants you to experience that same freedom. He wants you to experience His comfort. He wants you to know that it is possible.
If you’re at a point in your life where you’re thinking, “There is no hope for me,” “It won’t go away,” or “I’ve tried everything,” let me tell you: there is hope.
Mary Magdalene was one of Jesus’ most devoted followers, and Luke 8:2 tells us that she had been healed of evil spirits and diseases, and that seven demons had gone out of her.
If there was hope for Mary, who carried so much oppression, there is hope for me, and there is hope for you.
The Lord wants to heal your heart.
Recently, our church leadership had a teaching on deliverance and freedom, and I wanted to share some of the categories discussed in the “Soul/Spirit Hurts or Wounds” section.
The reality is that sometimes the roots of depression and anxiety can be connected to wounds in our soul and spirit—things we have experienced, carried, and never fully healed from.
Pastor Paul from The Belonging Co. listed the following categories:
Childhood:
Rejection
Abandonment
Neglect
Emotional abuse
Physical abuse
Sexual abuse
Shame
Bullying
Life Events:
Typical Emotional Manifestations:
Deep sadness
Anger
Fear
Shame
Loneliness
Hopelessness
I share these with you so that you can be aware.
Because if you’re not the one struggling with these things, you may now be able to identify them in your family, your friends, and the people around you—and call those things to light, so that they can live again.
God has such a purpose for His daughters.
Each and every one of you has a purpose and a plan. Do not let the enemy make you believe that it’s just a cliché.
In John chapter 14, Jesus says a key verse that is our verse of focus for today:
“Because I live, you also will live.”
Before this chapter, three major things occurred:
Jesus predicts His death.
Jesus predicts Judas’ betrayal.
Jesus predicts Peter’s denial.
And while all of this did occur, the beautiful thing is that in a moment where the disciples are receiving news that could bring heartache after heartache, the Lord chooses to:
Wash their feet.
Comfort them.
John 14:1–3 says:
“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”
Look at how He loved His disciples.
Look at how much He loves you.
This also applies to you, woman who is struggling to live. You, woman who is deeply saddened and troubled in spirit.
He is preparing a place for you.
Yesterday, as I was driving, I began to cry thinking about this: God loves us so much that He desires to save us from wrath. He has already prepared a place for you in eternity with Him.
And if we continue to verses 15–19, the comfort continues.
Jesus says:
“If you love me, keep my commands. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to help you and be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.”
You will live.
You will live because you are not alone.
You will live because the Holy Spirit is advocating for you.
The Holy Spirit is praying for you.
Romans 8:26 says:
“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.”
You will live because you know Him.
Despite the depression trying to take you out, despite the anxiety trying to take you out—you know Him.
And when you accepted Him, you entered into a life with Him.
So I need you to hear me today:
You will live.
Not because life will never hurt.
Not because you will never struggle.
Not because you will never have another difficult day.
You will live because Jesus lives.
And because He lives, you can live again.
I want to close with this excerpt that I heard on a podcast this week:
“Why should we believe in Jesus? On Ask Pastor John
This is what he says:
“There are reasons, lots of reasons, oh my goodness, that you should believe in Jesus, even if your life is not better now, even if it is better without Him. Lots of reasons. If you trust Him as your Savior and Lord and treasure, He will forgive all your sins, past, present and future, because He died in your place. He will make you eternally secure so that from the moment you are justified, declared perfect, with the perfection of Jesus, you can know that you will someday be glorified forever and ever and ever.
He will adopt you into His family and call you His daughter. Think of it, a daughter of God the creator of the universe. He promises that as a daughter, you will inherit absolutely everything God owns in the universe in the age to come. He will put everything at your disposal for your benefit forever.
He promises that in spite of all the hardships in this life, His yoke will be easy and His burden will be light because He’ll help you carry it. He promises to never leave you or forsake you but always to be with you until the very end. The precious friendship of Jesus right now and all your life. He promises that absolutely everything will work together for your good, even the bad things when your life is falling apart. He is that wise, He is that strong, He is that good. He will pursue you with goodness and mercy all your days. He will never turn away from doing good to you. He’ll rejoice over you with all His heart and with all His soul. It actually says that in Jeremiah 32:40. He will help you and strengthen you and hold you up with His victorious right hand in all your trials. He promised to guide the humble in what is right and to lead us in paths of righteousness for His namesake.
YOU WON’T BE LEFT WITHOUT GUIDANCE.
And when you are old, He will still be with you. He will carry you. And at the end, He will deliver you from the wrath of God, and instead of God’s wrath, He will bring you into eternal life in God’s presence where there is fullness of joy and pleasures at His right hand for evermore and it cannot get better than that. Fullness of joy forever.”
Go on, and live Daughter.
Love,
The Hem Community
