When is a good time for a crisis? Most likely you quickly shouted, “NEVER!”
Mental illness (MI) interrupted my life when my son lost touch with reality. Chris was a junior in high school. I was the Director of Instruction at a Christian school. A school I helped start with just one other administrator, Sam.
The school began as a ministry of our mega church. With a congregation of 10,000 members, the school’s enrolment exploded in a few short years. The first year we had 380 students. In the second year, there were 570 students. By the fifth year, the enrolment swelled to 1,000! The headmaster and I were a little busy.
So when I needed to stay home with Chris, Sam was left to oversee it all. During the time of my absence, I visited our pastor.
“How’s it going, Vicki,” he compassionately asked.
“Chris is in the hospital. I’m concerned about Sam.”
“Why?”
“Because he needs my help with the school.”
Then my pastor made a statement that shocked me.
“God doesn’t need you, Vicki.”
His words made me wince.
That wasn’t very nice. He knows I’m going through this crisis. How could he say such a thing? Isn’t he supposed to say comforting words?
I quickly learned my pastor spoke God’s Truth in love. Those words helped me realize I’d been relying on myself instead of God. Eventually, that statement freed me from worry. Whenever I struggled to handle an insurmountable problem, that truth readjusted my focus. His words echoed in my mind, reminding me God’s in control.
God doesn’t need you, Vicki. He’s quite capable of solving this problem. He’s accomplishing His perfect plan in your life.
Paul understood his inclination to rely on himself. He acknowledged that his heavenly Father used life’s pressures to help him trust in God alone. He reassured the church in Corinth, “We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead (2 Corinthians 1:8-9).”
As we raise our children with serious MI, we can feel as though it’s a task “far beyond our ability to endure.”
Do you feel like Paul? Are you under such great pressure that you despair of life itself? Listen to Paul’s encouragement. His voice of experience reminds you, “Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ (2 Corinthians 1:21).”
Whatever we face today, we can stand firm in Christ.
Chris Tomlin reminds us God is more than enough in his song, “Enough”
MI: mom 2 mom 