when I woke up Sunday

As a twenty year old in the throes of depression, I cried to the LORD a lot, but there is one prayer that has been replayed in my head for the last several weeks. I had already spoken all the desperate things I could think of in pleading for Him to take away the gloom. I only on one occasion ever did something that others found out about that harmed myself, but by the time I cried this particular prayer to Him, I knew I would not take my life, half out of fear, but half out of really wanting to live. My prayer? Kind of like this, "Lord, I don't want to wake up one day and be forty and look back to see a wasted life". I wanted to live in color, not in the gray haziness of depression.

It was shortly after that, that I learned something very important while reading about depression. A lesson that has stuck with me over the years and has saved me and those around me from much heartache. It's nothing profound just that as believers we must live by our wills not by our feelings, no matter how low they go, and our wills should line up with His will. After I learned that He took the depression from me.

Now, I'm trying to be careful here because I don't want this to be about depression, but about His amazing faithfulness that can be seen when we hold on and wait on Him till we reach a better vantage point to see the road we have traveled. I was so full of excitement waiting the last few weeks for last Sunday to arrive because on that day I woke up and I was forty.

This was a day I had anticipated like no other, not for presents or birthday greetings, but because it was the day I cringed when thinking about twenty years ago, the day I feared for what the twenty years between may contain, but in reality it was the day He already had planned for me back when I was crying to Him in fear that I might be a wasted life. I have not lived a grey hazy life, but a rather colorful one. I have seen the greatness of His faithfulness to one who hasn't always listened, one who has been stubborn, one who has questioned, yet He has remained faithful. He has allowed blessings along with correction both of which amaze me because they speak of His intense love for me.

Looking back at the twenty year old I was, I'm thankful He led me down the detour of darkness. Even though I had given Him my life as a teen, my plans for the future were mine. I had not sought His guidance in the direction for my life. I had planned to rely on achievements to allow me to make my own way in life. I wanted a career to take me away from any memories of childhood. No family, no relationships, no connections. He had other plans. He knew my deepest desires that I couldn't yet recognize. The desire for connections, family... He gave me a painful detour, but it led me to His blessings.

Now in place of the childhood I thought to run from, He gave me five "childhoods" to make beautiful. Not only that, but I now realize that had I not had the childhood He allowed, I would not be the mom that I am.

Jeremiah 29:11 (You know this one, I'm sure!)