Les Miserable...Hope Deferred...The Valley of the Shadow...

I Dreamed a Dream....

I dreamed a dream in times gone by

When hope was high
And life worth living
I dreamed that love would never die
I dreamed that God would be forgiving.

Then I was young and unafraid
And dreams were made and used and wasted
There was no ransom to be paid
No song unsung, No wine untasted

But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart
And they turn your dream to shame

He slept a summer by my side
He filled my days with endless wonder
He took my childhood in his stride
But he was gone when autumn came

And still I dream he'll come to me
That we'll live the years together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms we cannot weather

I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I'm living
So different now from what it seemed
Now life has killed the dream I dreamed...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wow. What downer lyrics! But that is what was playing in my head when I woke up this morning. Yes. I have again awakened in the slough of despond, wrestling that R.O.U.S., reptile of unusual size - called depression - (which seems to come on the heels of any and every seeming victory now).  I awakened from restless slumber once more finding myself in the "bog of eternal stench", also known as "self-pity", a self-made "Les' Miserable", a place of torment, punishment, and deep, deep, darkness.

And why not? It is a logical place from which to wake up, when one has gone there to cry oneself to sleep the night before! It is a shameful place, a hateful place - a place that at least seems separated from God, and frankly the only place one can go when one is angry at Him! Though I am one of the few people I know who would say that out loud.....

This place is a lonely place. And it is made especially bitter by the fact that everyone who has managed to side-step the slope that plummets one into this valley, loves to stand on the precipice and judge those who have tumbled over into it! Prating religious platitudes - which are, of course, intended to relieve the suffering, but which more often - because they are usually steeped in self-righteous judgment - only compound the weight that already presses the soul into the mire beneath! Each judgment pushes the fallen one down another layer until one is nearly buried alive in sorrow - the sorrow of regrets, missed opportunities, failed Christianity, etc. all which complicate the original issue of long held hopes, which - for unseen or unexplained reasons - have been once again - for an undetermined time - deferred....

Utter exhaustion usually precedes the tumble. Exhaustion from believing for ships that apparently never come in! Fatigue - from searching the horizon day after day for dreams promised - until the sun goes down on those dreams - again. Then the long business of trudging back in the dark shadows to where I just came from - to live out another restless night of the same - worn out - frazzled - realities turned nightmares - because it didn't come - again. That is the picture of hope deferred....

Tears multiply like the summer rains - the sun comes out only long enough to dry the surface - but underneath is rotting, molding, dank, destruction - as hope disintegrates in the sorrows of - "what if" - ".... I heard wrong?"; "... I didn't make the grade, hit the mark, pass the test...etc."? "...I've tumbled too often - and God is finally angry with me?" Well?! Didn't that happen to Moses? Who am I next to Moses?! And the whisperer with his hot, garbage smelling breath - whom we should know by now not to listen to - comes to stir the fires of anguish, and to heap ever higher the coals of despair....hoping to snuff our diminishing hope once and for all....

Meanwhile the friends of the church - like Job's unwanted visitors - come to "instruct" us - sigh, again - feigning loving patience, though obviously incredulous at our obvious lack of maturity and understanding - conveniently forgetting how many times they have been here recently...they come - mostly uninvited - to "encourage" us in "the faithfulness of God"....to remind us of "the hope that is within us"....they can have no idea, of course, of the beating which that hope has taken only yesterday - of the starved image which that word now conjures in our minds...they mean no harm...they mean to comfort...and sometimes...the very fact that they have come does comfort...or at least distracts from the loneliness.

Unfortunately however, if I do make the minutest move toward the surface, these helpful ones immediately begin to heap their own burdens over onto me, since I am so used to carrying them... since I have gotten so good at the "glad game" myself...and when they leave... usually encouraged...I fall into the same exhausted heap which they imagine themselves to have pulled me from...wondering how many times I myself have played the part of Job's comforters...with great ambitions... great intentions...and so little discernment....? ugh...and the spiral continues... Yet....

Through the din and uproar of religious and demonic and fleshly fits...there is another small voice that speaks...when I am quite finished with my temper tantrum.... at being put off ...again... if I am ready to listen now....kind...truly patient...dare I take that hand again? Dare I not?

This has been an age old process for me. Though it does sound, feel, look and taste hopeless - yet - I remember - how - through God - I have fought my way to this place from much darker places... from the fires of a childhood born in hell - where my soul and body were ravaged daily to satiate the lusts of those who should have cared for me (along with a large host of their family, friends and associates..) ... early on, at the age of three, my young soul...already robbed of her innocence, beauty, sanctity and self...saw Yeshua as He passed by, and grasped the hem of His garment, I found, and latched onto with all my might, the Tzit-Tzit of His Tallit...and then I closed my eyes and practiced a great propensity to absorb the pain and forget the reasons for it, while developing a gift of remembering scripture verses and lyrics to comforting hymns....in this way I survived the original bog of eternal stench...and emerged eventually...still holding tightly to the only sure thing ever offered to me...

I have also persevered the troubled days of youth and the beginning years of adult freedom - wherein my brokenness had progressed to the early stages of multiple-personality disorder - so adept was I at separating myself from the pain - if pain came to one personality I simply fled to another - or developed another on the spot - there was a persona that could answer all types - that could protect me by causing threatening people to flee...It didn't help the rejection issues - but at that time rejection was considered a necessary evil...still... from the darkness of now self-made usury...for reasons I could not then fathom...I called out to Him in desperation and He heard my cry...He came walking to me on the storm of these rampant psychological disorders and He calmed the seas...He reunited my three distinct personae into one broken one...filled that one glued - cracked - vessel with His Spirit and went to work to collect all the remaining, practically undetectable shards, to remake a vessel of purity and beauty....to fill all the "worm-holes", smooth over the cracks...to insert Himself into every spot that was lacking... to prevent the evil from returning....

I have waged holy war through the last 30 years of a marriage that has yet to live up to the promises which I believe God made to me all those years ago, nor the vision which I am sure that I was given for Holy Matrimony! There has been so much warfare and so few rewards (only seven in 30 years! lol)...there has been such a fight to stay connected at all...and so little romance or intimacy (obviously we had "sex" - there are seven kids... but how many understand that sex does not insure intimacy...nor does it always spring from it... a wife has her "duties"... I was told...I was very dutiful...don't you think? lol)...

This lack of personal connection was due to much interference of the enemy... in addition to individual and corporate issues ... Issues which the church world (under the influence of the enemy I believe) has gladly and incessantly exploited for their own means at our expense... no wonder the divorce rate is as high or higher in the church than it is in the unbelieving world...the church uses our avoidance to fuel its projects!  Yet - I have held on - beseeching God to connect us or release me...and I KNOW that His Spirit is working...and the Church in her own brokenness has been an instrument of both sides (the helper and the hindrance).... in spite of her, or because of her (we suspect both).... we are beginning to see signs of the kind of wholeness in both of us individually...finally.. that can facilitate that kind of holy intimacy... at last.... and not a minute too soon...I have felt so faint for so long....

In all of that time... since I found deliverance.... I have faithfully cared for ailing "leadership" and aging parents...none of whom technically deserved my care... but thankfully, few of us get what we really deserve... I've tried to help siblings escape the family pit/ugliet of generational strongholds ... talk about skeletons in the closet.... if our skeletons ever come out of the closet it will look like Ezekiel 37! But I am glad to say that finally, tediously, mine have been exhumed, taken out, addressed, and given a decent burial... but my siblings are still haunted by the rattling in the night and I hurt for them...but so far... they are not able, nor willing to receive help from me...so I have withdrawn the offer - refusing to be Job's comforters to them... another religious stick that inflicts pain...helpless to help I pray...and wait... and believe that God will deliver them...if only to shut me up! lol

Since God saw fit to bless our union with physical fruit...until the other fruit can come...I have contributed the lion's share to the raising of our seven children...(while Gene paid all the bills to keep us up and running...while trying to out-run his own skeletal army... being used up by the church...)....I have faithfully fed, clothed and taught these people how to learn, how to repent, how to find God in the darkest of nights, how to think for oneself, how to make boundaries which codependents can not cross....

And though I thank God that I could accomplish any of that...it was only by His grace...of course.... and I am so grateful that He helped me so I could impart something to them besides generational strongholds....yet, I grieve that I can not help them more...that I can not ease their financial burdens... due to drowning in the sea of lack...painfully sinking in some kind of material sucking quicksand ourselves ...

Looking on...ever on...from the outside of God's flow of blessing... grateful for grace but tired of needing it....while others our age...and many much younger... are reaping the harvest of their giving and work and service to others ...yet we can not seem to reach that oasis of rest for ourselves. . .

We watch in frustration...and yes even envy....as... they take trips.... they succeed in business and ministry (in which we frankly have more gifts and abilities,etc.)....they buy their children cars... put them through college...they go to Israel whenever they deem it good....while I sit here feeling very much like God's "Red-headed step-child.... suffocating on lack... taking advantage of sunny days to dry my laundry...depending on the goodness of friends to keep our cars running...wishing for Israel...or even for real consistent grocery money....for anything to be easy, instead of as hard as it gets, for a change... desperately longing, waiting, praying, begging, for break-through...for success on any level....

And yes...I do pitch tantrums... hissy fits...as we call them in the south...at God.... and He - in His infinite mercy - loves me right on...

Over the years I have taken in much teaching of the Church ... (wow. that is SUCH a gross understatement!).... I have digested libraries of information...so desperate was I to gain an understanding that might bring freedom... I have shown up when asked...sang when asked..worshiped where put....cleaned when asked...ministered when asked... been the buffer between them and evil when required...interceded whether asked or not....cared for nursery through young adults when needed....cooked food when requested...

While they helped the enemy nearly dismantle my marriage...while they stepped in and usurped my authority with my children on more than one occasion...making an already nearly impossible job even harder...

Still...because it seemed the right thing to do....I "humbled myself.....meaning that I have beaten myself bloody and crawled on hands and knees to submit to their leadership... to jump through their ever-rising hoops... straining to meet their ever increasing standards...only at the end of a 20+year race to find I still came up short in their eyes...because the one thing I would not do is - excuse me, but decent words fail here - "kiss ass" ... so at the end, as I say, of nearly 30 long years....to finally just leave that track of futility... in seeming defeat....still labeled as deficient... Jezebel... traitor...

One who, in honest reality, had been more loyal than they could find the courage to admit....I've finally gained the courage and permission to run away from that exercise in religious futility.. to run after Yeshua - hoping I can still catch up to Him - that I can still finish MY RACE with some kind of honor...

And yes I still fall down...a lot...but hey...did I mention I was also born with a club-foot....? So, that I run at all is Grace....

In it all, God has faithfully delivered - cleansed - restored (memories - wholeness - etc.) - and has faithfully led me out of all those phases of potential destruction - until - here I am - clothed properly and in my right mind (most of the time).... delivered of the legions of issues that my horrific life should have produced.... I am a poster-child of His faithfulness.

One would think, then, that I would be the least prone to depression, and the self-pity monster...but that is really sort of illogical. It is actually sort of miraculous that I have so many days when I do NOT tumble! It is a credit to His greatness - and to my faith -  that I have ANY sunny days after the ride I've had!  In fact, it  is paramount to the parting of the Red Sea - at least! lol

Since, in the natural, I have more medically document-able reasons for depression than most folks living! Good thing I don't personally own any guns I guess - no doubt "Big Brother" would come for them immediately! No comments on that one please! lol

I have been asked through the years how I can ever get depressed when God has done so much for me? That appears to be a really good question! Yet it somehow always becomes as one of the sticks which beat me, when I do take the tumble into the bog of despair! But logically it is a stupid question.

We are not just spirit beings. Even after being born again, even after being filled with the Spirit - we still have to contend with these fleshly beings until the transformation process is complete. And my fleshly being - as they said of the old race horse - has been "run hard and put up wet". It has had a rough ride, as -  they say, "It ain't the years, honey, its the mileage!"  

I liken myself to the love-sick girl in The Song of Songs who - when criticized for her dark skin - said, "I have kept my brother's vineyard, but my own vineyard I have not kept"! I have not taken the best care of me! There have been too many others to care for! And instead of sheltering me all these years, the best the church has been able to do is harp on how rough I am around the edges! For example, most likely, I lost several sanctimonious ones at the "a" word, in the upper paragragh...as though God is all through with them...but we all know that some sins are more socially acceptable than others....

On top of all that, I think that age will not be my friend in this process! I find that it is getting harder to find a place of trust and hope as the years fly by like so many unused, expired coupons. It was hard enough when strength seemed an endless supply and all of life stretched before me as an unwritten page! But now that most of it lies crumpled behind me... like a trail of ripped out, wadded up pages - of ruined drawings, badly rhymed poems, unread writings, rejected work....for what does one then hope?

How does one scrape up the courage now? How does one find strength to go on? I love to remind myself of Joseph, Abraham and Moses - but the first one came into his dream at a much younger age than I now am, and the other two - well - I am not sure I can wait until I am nearly a hundred, since my chances of making it are scientifically unsupportable! If I do make it it WILL be FAITH! Trust me on that one! Time is of the essence. Time is a constant threat to my hope...

And yet, another day has been granted to me, another chance to live, hope and dream, another sun has arisen, and with it the gleaming vestiges of that eternal hope...as well honed training, deliberately set habits...kick in...leading me to the Word from which I draw my strength...which keeps my dimly lit embers of hope burning on...I say with the faithful David, God's Beloved King, "Why are you cast down oh my soul! (again..)!? My soul, hope thou in God! For I will yet again Praise Him - the Help of my countenance, and my God!"

Y'all may get tired of hearing this, but if I ever stop saying it send the ambulance..."His grace IS sufficient"!  It is. If I ONLY gain heaven, at the end of a long uphill, rigged as hell race, it will still be worth it all...but it ain't over yet...the old girl is still kicking..."The Just shall LIVE by Faith"...that does not mean that they won't take a few tumbles...it just means they won't rot in the bog ...so... thanks to the Hope that the Spirit of the Living God has put within me... the journey continues...thanks for traveling with me.....

Selah....

Comments

[Robin]

Sandra as the song says "were it not for grace, I can't tell you where I'd be" One of seven children, exposed to much verbal, physical abuse, orphaned by age 4years old, lived in foster care most
of my life. (there is more) but I choose to (as you say) bury the skeletons and move on.
I was blest to have been the wife of a precious man of God for 33 years, whom God has now called home.(I miss him so much)
I have also struggled wiith depression, but having worked in the medical field of nursing.... I have learned that depresson can be caused from a chemical imbalance, also have learned I have and am
Hypoglycemic..... I must watch my diet of high carbs and low sugars, eat protein 3x's a day and drink caffine beverages very weak or not any at all for best results. When my diet is on cue, for the
most part I mentally feel okay. I do think that much in the Medical Industry of diagnois is a guessing game. A Doctor did not point out my hypoglycemic, I just learned it thru nursing and
recognizing the symptoms. Bought myself a glucose monitor to regulate my bloodsugar. Low blood sugar can cause ALL kinds of depression, mood swings and personality disorders.
I still have some warped, hurt and damaged emotions and living each day one breath at a time. Will a change in diet alleviate my inner pains and emotional pains? No, only the Lord can do this, he
promised us he came to set the captives free and to tear down strongholds, deceptions and lies that the ememy throws upon us.
Apostle Paul had a thorn in his flesh to keep him from being puffed up beyond measure. I've come to believe that perhaps my damaged internal emotions is my thorn in the flesh to keep me from being
puffed up or exaltng myself.
I have been blest from your blogs, Thank you and God Bless / Robin

[Sandra Carlton Duncan]

Hi Robin!


Thanks for leaving a comment! I am still somewhat challenged in navigating some of these things, so I just found it! I am os sorry to be so long in responding! I don't have a premium account, so
it isn't quite as "user friendly"! 


I hope things are still going well for you, and improving. I hear what you are saying about the physical issues contributing to the emotional/spiritual stuff! We are a unified being, and have to
take ALL parts into consideration! If only the Body of Christ could get that memo! lol  


I also hear what you are saying about "the thorn in the flesh", and have often considered it as I've struggled to overcome the depths of my emotional damage. But the good news is that I have
overcome! I do still fight the good fight, but I win more than I lose now days! And yes, I watch what I consume as well, because general health does contribute to the overall well-being! 


Again, thank you for your comment, and you can also find me on Face Book - if you ever need to contact me in a timely fashion. I will be praying for you in days to come, that you will reach a
place of Peace and Joy that you have never known, and that it will become the new normal! 


Loves and hugs, from a fellow journeyman!  ~ Sandra D. 


 


 

[Pollyanna]

Oh, Sandra, I am fighting depression as well! Your honesty helps and blesses me and I love you very much. Shalom will come, I hope soon.