UNEASY

Today I have an uneasy feeling...I don't know what to do anymore. No matter what I do nothing seems to change. Then I get frustrated and discouraged. After that the depression takes over and nothing is getting done today.  

I'm trying, really trying...but just can't get the mountain to budge, not even an inch. 

DEPRESSION

 Or rejection stones in my pocket as I wade into the deep water.

“I have called you by name, you are mine. “ Isaiah 43:1

The thought just went through my head of an A. A. type group. A room filled with people and the speaker says “Hello, my name is Robin and I’m Depressed”. There are a lot of people who could be a part of such a group.

Depression is an inescapable tomb. I feel unworthy of climbing out of that pit of despair. I became so ensnared within my own sadness that I had begun to have deep dark thoughts of hurting myself.

The deep, underlying reason for my depression is REJECTION-or rather the FEAR of REJECTION.

I became so afraid of being rejected that I let it stiffle my entire being. The creative things that I once enjoyed doing, I have no interest in now. The happiness I used to feel-gone. I've become even more introverted feeling safe only within and yet...I have at times rejected myself.

Yes, that's right-I have rejected myself. I've actually participated in the self talk of "your so stupid", "you can't do anything right". So yes it is very possible to reject ones self.

There are those around me that, although they mean well, really don't help with the "well cheer up ", "well if you would get out of the house you might feel better". They just don't understand...depression isn't something that you can just flip a switch and it's over. No, it's something that's with you all your life. If it wasn't there wouldn't be any deaths because of it.

Recently though I've come to see things in a different light. A distant relative and I have started talking through Facebook/messenger. She had come across this youtube series called "The Chosen" that she thought might help me.

Yes, it is religious, but it isn't (at least not to me) a shove it down your throat kind of thing. It is interesting to me how they have brought to life the characters. Each one comes to life in away that just reading the Bible never really did for me.

It made sense to me from the beginning. And I've learned things about the different characters that reading never showed me. Like Matthew, his character was literally hated by even his own family just because he was good at his job. Now, I don't know if they meant to do this or if I'm just seeing things, but I felt like Matthew has a form of autism. I mean he's super good at math and doesn't lie, cheat or steal. He's honest to a fault and is so misunderstood because of it. If anyone could be depressed it's him...REJECTED by his piers, co-workers and his own family.

Yet JESUS saw him just as a person. "ARE YOU COMING"?, JESUS said to him the first time he saw him. There were no papers to fill out-no background or credit checks. There wasn't an allotment of time spent in thought about it. No HE simply asked Matthew "ARE YOU COMING"? JESUS, wanted him with the group. HE wanted Matthew with HIM. JESUS found Matthew WORTHY of being near HIM.

I guess I've felt like Matthew to a certain degree-that being REJECTION. You feel unheard, unwanted, not understood. Like no one really cares for or about you. Lost totally alone. Like no one even knows your name. And then JESUS says "I have called you by name, you are MINE." and "ARE YOU COMING"?

YES I AM!!!!!

God don't make no junk! (So true)

I’ve come to see that my favorite character in the chosen-after Jesus,of course-is Matthew. Here was a person who was hated and rejected by everyone. The Romans didn’t like him (although one had come to), the Jews didn’t like him, because he was good at his job. The worst of it all is the fact that his own family didn’t like him or want him.  I believe that he (according to the way he is portrayed) had a form of Autism known as Aspergers.  While I don’t claim to be Autistic I do kind of understand how he must have felt. Before he saw Jesus his only friend was a stray dog that had started to follow him. I’m sure that he felt like the entire universe hated him.  I too have felt that way, like no one cared if I was alive or not. I so much can identify with this character. Shy, awkward, lonely, desperate to know what my purpose in this world is-where am I suppose to fit in at. 

And then he saw Jesus.......

From that split second on his whole world began to change. He became brave enough to go to his mother and speak with her about the stirrings that had started within him,(even though she rejected him yet again). He began to question life as he had known it. He wanted to know more about this person called Jesus of Nazareth. He climbed up a latter and sat on the edge of a roof to see. I don’t think he would have done so if it had not been for that one split second down by the shore. He wanted to know who was this amazing man that-for the first time in Matthews life-really saw him and smiled at him. 

He was so moved just by the sight of Jesus, that when Jesus stops and calls him by name and asked him to follow him, Matthew hesitates just for a second and then drops EVERYTHING and immediately began to follow him. 

I wish I had been as brave when GOD called me to follow.......