Here is a devotional entry I wrote a few months ago. Hope this will bless you!
“‘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 hope and a future.’” Jeremiah 29:11
Throughout my growing up years, and most of my college experience, my family was in a constant state of falling apart. There were some things that were completely out of my control that tore roughly into the deep places of my heart, resulting in some ugly emotional scars and, if I say so myself, some highly unattractive personality traits. As a young girl, I invested myself in prayer, begging for God to make my family whole. But, alas, things only got worse with the passing of time. I concluded then that God was not interested in listening to me. In my mind, I believed I was simply a second-rate child of God who did not get the V.I.P. service. Somehow, I missed the memo and my lot in life would be to wait after those with the upgraded membership.
When I became older, my circumstances seemed to me more than I could handle and, being the logical individual that I am, I no longer saw the stock in bringing my problems before the God who ignored me. I am invisible. The whispered words swam through my mind, soaked my logic in the lie that this was how God perceived me.
I turned, accordingly, to an alternative source of coping.
Since I had always been naturally inclined toward academics anyway, I did not even realize when this certain shift took place in my heart and mind. Very subtly, I turned school and success into my escape. When things got hard and control ripped itself from my grasp, I threw myself into my studies, complete with picky perfectionism, as this was the one thing in my life that I felt I could control. I had determined for myself one ultimate goal: to graduate from a university far, far away, then all would be well in the world and all my dreams would somehow come true.
I worked hard in high school, enjoying my classes, getting good grades, gaining knowledge and experience. Finally, college approached and I dove in head first. Throughout the entirety of my college experience, I was the student being told by her parents to study less and have a little more fun. How many parents have that problem? Then, it came…graduation. The day I had always anticipated, but never truly believed would come. I had cycled myself through a plethora of fabulous post-graduate ideas but, one by one, they all fell through and I was left without the big flashy plan I had expected to have by then.
Another thing I had not expected at graduation was the subsequent nine months of anxiety withdrawals (seriously), recovering from the years of constant stress and learning to live in a completely different way for the rest of my life. School was over and done, never to be repeated. It could be prolonged with grad school and an endless pursuit of degrees, but it did not change the fact that my quarter-life goal had been accomplished with three quarters of my life to spare. And this quarter of life was all I had ever known. I didn’t know how to operate any other way. I was hit by the limitless and unsafe realm of anything is possible, mulling over the question, “What do I do with the rest?”
It took me a while to realize that I was struggling with more than a simple crisis of direction. I had lost my purpose. My structure was gone. For the first time in my life, I saw that, instead of turning to substance abuse and other obvious vices, I had made school and success my drugs of choice. Every passed test and completed course fed my sense of control that I never felt capable of in my home life.
I realized a simple truth: I am no better than anyone else who turns to substance abuse or any other behavioral vice to cope with their pain and anger. It all involves turning to something besides God in an attempt to fix things on our own. I am guilty of being a success junkie and turning to school for my comfort and fulfillment.
My behavior made me wonder how I could have claimed, over all this time, to truly trust in God. All the while growing up, and in college, I sang praises to the Lord about how I loved and trusted Him when, really, I had stopped laying certain parts of my life before Him years before because I did not trust Him with it. What does that say about my entire life, which I have supposedly devoted to my faith in Christ? Has our relationship really been shallow all along?
A flood of realization cascaded over me. My need for control had created an idol that dominated my life and took the place of the God I proclaimed to love and serve. After all, why stay faithful to the God who seemed to pass over me like a stranger on the street? I am invisible even to God. The lie had grown weeds with thick roots down into my heart and, unbeknownst to me, the time had come to uproot them.
My long withdrawal period from my old life stung quite a bit and I really had no way of turning back to my addictive habits again. I went from such longstanding mental chaos to a comparatively extreme period of isolation, which was, in many ways, the most intense emotional loneliness I have ever known. My vulnerability forced me to the throne of Christ, where I could only be real with myself and with Him. Here, I realized and faced this subtle, yet engulfing, sin in my life.
I understand now that even the most seemingly harmless things in life can hold the same poisonous traps that the enemy would use to pull us away from Christ. Traps that whisper lies to blur and distort our perception of His true nature. And it has taken all this time for me to grasp even this portion of the Truth, that God is not ignorant of me. He sees me and He loves me more than I can fathom.
I know that God has a plan and purpose for my life. He created me to be the one to withstand this exact life that I live. I cannot compare the way God chooses to direct my life with the way He chooses to direct others.
I know that God did not cause for things in my family to go haywire but He allowed them to happen for a good reason, which He will use to bring glory to Himself. For that, I am thankful.
And for the first time since I was a child, as I continue to give up my need for control and wash my mind in Truth, in order to flush out my old and false way of thinking, I know that God sees me and that He is trustworthy above all others. I may feel unseen at times among my own kind, but no matter what I do or how I feel, I am not invisible to Him. Lord, please allow for me to see You clearly, as You see me.
“She gave this name to the LORD who spoke to her: ‘You are the God who sees me,' for she said, 'I have now seen the One who sees me.’” Genesis 16:13
