Not understanding my mother's condition, and lost in the surrounding shame and fear of watching her decline into her private emptiness, my family hid rather than helped. Ultimately, the dark cloud would overwhelm my mother, and she committed suicide.

I suppose a part of me has always dreaded this same sort of fate, for many years recklessly trying to fulfill this false destiny with the most destructive of behaviors, and twice attempting to take my own life. But then... then something happened. I discovered that at the source of my aching emptiness there lay a soul dying of loneliness. And, crying out to the God I had spent my whole life running away from, I discovered He had been there all along.

Returning to the Flock

Why are we so afraid to open ourselves to others, to uncover our wounds and let them see, let them touch? Why do we so often succumb to this shame that keeps us in bondage? I believe it is because we allow the shame to isolate us, to cut us off from others and therefore perpetuate the illusion of our being alone. Only by culling us from the flock, so to speak, can the enemy kill us.

And so, the lies draw us deeper into the deception of self-loathing. Christ - and those who truly share His nature - wait to welcome us Home. But lost in this darkest of places, on this seemingly unstoppable train barreling down the mountain, we simply have trouble believing we can ever jump to the safety of His arms.

How do we abandon ourselves to such trust? We must learn to reach out.

First, we need to seek professional help. The new generation of psychotropic drugs is far less dangerous and much more effective than those drugs used in my mother's time. We look for doctors who understand the multiplicity of this disease dynamic. These professionals, if they fully understand that drugs alone are not the ultimate answer, can give those suffering from depression a fighting chance, a helping hand out of the pit, thus enabling them to do the physical, emotional, and spiritual work necessary for long term recovery. Ultimately, we who battle this thing can re-engage with the world, with life... with Christ.

Then, we need a support system, a fellowship, a safe place for connecting with those who have lived some part of their lives suffering from the pain of similar wounds. We move beyond our comfort zone and, one day at a time, seek the healing face of Christ, often in the faces of strangers who are seeking their own recovery. This is a biblically sound principal, yet one sometimes looked down on by those in the Christian church.

These days, some of the people I work with both inside and outside the church walls have trouble with the whole "recovering" thing, as if true healing is somehow less miraculous when performed as a process rather than an event. But to me, nothing could be more beautiful or meaningful than a God who is willing to meet me on my knees every morning, and to walk with me one step at a time, this friend Jesus who seeks intimacy rather than waving a magic wand. And, by connecting with others suffering from similar hurts, we open ourselves to His deeply relational - and uniquely beautiful - healing.