Luke 15 has a story called the prodigal son. I am sure everyone who has been going to church for a while has heard it or heard about it. Basically one of 2 sons of this father decides he wants his half of the inheritance early and so his father gives it to him. The son goes out partying and spending all the money. He winds up on a pig farm to try and make enough for him to live and he finds himself eating the food the pigs are eating because he is so hungry.
This son then decides to return home when he has the realization that his fathers servants eat better than he is. He comes up with this whole speech about how he did wrong and he doesn’t deserve grace and forgiveness and just hopes his father will let him be a servant. The father was searching for his son when the son decided to return home. The father sees him coming and runs to him (something he was not generally supposed to do). The son starts the speech when his father stops him.His father tells his servants to get the finest robe and ring for his child. He tells them to kill and make the fattened calf and hosts a party because his lost son came home.
Now before I go further, I just wanted to say the father is God and the osn could very well be you. Maybe you once were close to God and then you ran away because you found something you thought was better and found out it wasn't. Just like the father in that story, if you start coming back to God, God will come running to you, you just need to make the decision to come back to Him.
There have been multiple times I’ve been like the prodigal son. The time I remember the most was 2018 after my senior year. If you’ve been around for a while, you will know that my senior year was rough. It still is one of the hardest years of my life that I have had to go through, but I wouldn't take it back for a minute.
Towards the end of my senior year I was really struggling with my mental health. I mean like REALLY struggling. It wasn’t pretty. And for some gosh darn reason I thought it would be better to live a life I wanted (well thought I wanted, what I actually was living was a life fueled by my mental health disorders) then a life of a christian.
I don’t completely remember that time or what I was completely thinking but I know I was struggling with my faith. I was struggling with the stigma of mental health in the church. People would say that anxiety was lack of faith or if I just had enough faith, my depression wouldn’t be so bad or they couldn’t understand why I was struggling so much when I had so much faith.
During this time, I wasn’t as on fire for God as I had been. For one I had gotten in a relationship that didn’t push me closer to God but in a way pushed me away (especially when I was really struggling and wasn’t pushed to stay close with God and had no type of godly influence in my life).
I stopped going to church. I stopped talking to the people that meant a lot to me. I was self destructing and it wasn’t pretty. I was truthfully going down a dark path. I started to do things that were way out of who I am apart from my mental health. I was not living the best life. I was pushing people away and being around people who did not have a strong faith nor did they push me towards God during this time.
I would still occasionally do bible journaling when I got bored and when I knew I was doing bad but it was more for a reason to post and to make people think I was still doing fine and still have a strong faith. That was far from the truth. I had basically walked away from my faith.
What brought me back? Well it was a Thursday and I was having a hard time. I knew that my church had a thing for young adults called 1824 and it met on thursdays. I decided to go back.
Here’s the thing I wanted it to give me a reason to not go back honestly. I wanted no one to talk to me, me to not enjoy it, and me to never look back again. Is that what happened? No, God had other plans.
So I went and the first face I saw was of a leader in the church that meant a lot to me that I literally prayed would not be there. She was so welcoming and excited I had come. I met some new people that first week that just welcomed me with open arms. I joined a small group that week. I got reconnected with multiple people that week.
I didn’t realize how lost I was until I went. I didn’t realize how far away I had run away from God. That week, I decided to come back and God came running. I could feel Him in my life again. I could feel the light of God and wasn’t so much consumed by the darkness.
About a year later, my mom passed away. It was hard but I had the right people around me to help me through. A couple months later, satan had really gotten into my head. I was never actively suicidal but the suicidal ideation had become a lot and my psychiatrist decided it was best for me to go inpatient for a couple days. One thing I brought was my bible. I read it everyday I was there. While I felt low, I knew God wasn’t far away.
Why do I tell you that? I don’t think I could have gotten through those two events super well if I was still far away from God. I don’t think they would’ve gone super well with having God close.
I didn’t know those events were going to happen, but God did and He made sure to be close during both of them.
God still would’ve been there if I would’ve been far away and came to Him in those moments but there was a difference of being close to God before these things took place to completely walk through the events beforehand with Him then not having Him during the times beforehand and going to Him in the thick of it. Having God in the beginning of both these events helped me get through them tremendously.
I am the prodigal son. You may be too. But the key is that God comes running to you the moment He sees you going to Him.
Draw near to God and He’ll draw near to you.
Hold onto hope and stay strong.
Madison Rae <3
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