GLOOM -- yet God Inhabits the Praise of His People

I've been going pretty much cold turkey to quit the Lyrica, the Morphine, and the codeine (percocets and tyl. #3's) I was chuffing down before surgery. I don't need the pain meds now --though it's just been a week since the back surgery. I've been very emotionally vulnerable --can't explain depression--it just can come after events like this --and when you're getting off drugs, I'm sure. I feel the pain and misery of the whole grey world --and can't get motivated to do all I was going to do with Rob gone to Costa Rica on a mission trip and my mother at my brother's home this week. Jon gave me 1/2 Celexa tab, anti-depressant -- but I hope to do without it and not get addicted, but I'll take again if I really feel bad.

About food, I don't feel hunger --but I feel like I'm going to be ill if I don't eat --like I'm queasy. I feel like I have a bit of a bug --a gastrointestinal bug. And a young friend in the church to whom I've been giving rides and taking out to eat occasionally, has been so afflicted with similar symptoms. She's pregnant. I've wondered if my problems aren't hormonal as hers may be.

I've had longer periods of uninterrupted sleep --and slept til 10 this am which may sound lazy to you, but was good for me. I was feeling emotionally vulnerable when I got up, while pushing myself to put one foot ahead of the other, brushing teeth, sponge-bathing, etc --can't shower unless I have my husband home to change my band-aid on my back. It's interesting how clean and dry the incision has been for days --since they took the drain bag out at the hospital, I've had almost no residue on the band-aid, so I seem to be healing well.

While feeling gloomy, the phone rang.

IT was Focus on the Family --thanking us for a modest donation we made. The gentleman prayed with me. It seemed like the Lord's own call!

I came downstairs and blogged briefly --and then decided to look at the pool and the plants. Yes, the pool water level was precariously low, nearly below the skimmer, which would make the pump run dry which wouldn't be good --and some plants were near death.

So I rallied to the tasks --and while in there decided to sing the doxology and other praise songs while in there where the acoustics are great. What a lift to the soul --with the sun shining on the golden leaves seen through the windows.

I tend to feel distant from the Lord in times of depression and stress --and then I was reminded that "God inhabits the praises of His people." It's a Bible verse from somewhere. He DWELLS in our praises! So if we praise Him, He is nigh~ And I was in good voice, despite the ordeal of intubation that initially affected my vocal cords.

I felt such a lift. Got my jobs done. Decided to write about it.

One thing about pain, suffering, depression --I feel empathy for the miserable of the whole world --and I feel like a spoiled American to have any complaint. And to read of the difficulties of Christians around the world --and to know how someone in another country would just have to endure a cyst on their sciatic nerve. No question about it, when I feel this weight of the world's misery, on top of my own blessed life, I would rather just slip from life peacefully in my sleep, than to go through the depressing miseries that so many live with daily. I would rather go to Heaven than endure depression, but I know I must be patient. It's not that I long to die --hardly--but I hate this feeling!

I was upbeat during the surgery time --oddly felt times of elation and joy in recent weeks despite my problem --perhaps from Lyrica, etc. I want that sense of well-being from the Holy Spirit, and I notice that He is indeed helping me.

It does take a leap of faith --especially if you aren't raised to have faith as I was --to believe that one is online with the Creator of the Universe --that He is personal --that He cares for us --just as the Bible promises. But Jesus came to assure us --and sent His Holy Spirit to comfort us in His physical absence. As Thomas, who had to see to believe, said, "Lord, help thou my unbelief!" And Jesus said how blessed the people would be who believe in Him without seeing.

So I walk by faith --and not by sight.



"God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance and have eternal life."--the Bible