Thewhitedove

Oh, you sound like you are in so much pain. I just want to hug you. Go back to the doctor and tell them what your worst fears are. Let them see how serious this is. Antidepressants are very useful to give you some breathing space so you can sort out other aspects of your life. Once your mood is stabilising a bit, you can take a fresh look at your relationship with God, sort out your commitments to your family and studies etc and regulate your sleep patterns and diet. Sometimes we expect God to step in when He has already provided a solution. Go and chase up the doctor as a matter of urgency and go from there. There's nothing wrong with taking medication, if you need it. I took anti depressants some years ago and they were a bridge that helped me to get out of bed in the morning. I came off them once I sorted myself out. Antidepressants aren't addictive and can be life saving. God isnt distant, although it feels like it sometimes. He isnt though. It will all male sense when you look back. I'll be praying for you.

Sorry Jayne, it was late when I got back. So my colleague is gay and obviously I can't do anything about that, any more than my straight friends living with their boyfriends etc. I just don't mention her partner when we chat. I know they got 'married' but she didn't mention it to me which saved me the awkwardness of having to say anything. I just don't know how to approach it for that first moment when she tells me. I agree that every new life is a miracle and every baby is precious but I don't agree with the ideology of deliberately bringing a baby into a family with no father. I will of course care for my colleague and will celebrate the baby when he or she arrives, but there will be a moment of awkwardness when she tells me. I just want to honour God and also be sensitive to my colleague. I think your responses are absolutely perfect.

I'm overthrowing it. I feel like everything is some kind of test from God these days! I'm just going to be kind and normal. I don't judge her and actually get on with her really well. I got it into my head that God wanted me to take some kind of stand and I really didn't want to!

That's what I was feeling Ladypeartree!

Colleague is lovely, a really kind and supportive person who has actually been so helpful and caring towards me during a recent trial. I heard from someone that is pregnant. She is in a same sex relationship so I'm pretty sure there was some kind of insemination and there's no father on the scene. Sigh. How will I handle this? Gosh she is just so nice and has helped me so much but I'm absolutely dreading her telling me! Because what on earth can I say? Is there any way that I can honour God and still not be horrible about this?!

That's absolutely true. My husband has several tattoos and I like them. I would just love a really nice design to cover my tattoo up but am scared of making it worse. I've had a rough year and would love something to commemorate the strength God gave me and grace he showed me through it, preferably using the quote about joy coming in the morning. I just need a guarantee it wouldn't be ugly!

I was young, silly and unsaved. I actually lost my nerve at the last minute but felt pressured to go through with it. I cried as soon as I saw it, and cried again the next day. I hate it. Its just ugly; I love what it means.

No, my son is just a child. I don't really want another tattoo but at present can't show my foot in the summer as the tattoo is so ugly but would only cover it with something to glorify God.

Farouk, no I didn't. The original tattoo has my son's name in it and he was offended that I wanted to cover it! However, I now have some new inspiration that I've been thinking about lately. 'For weeping may endure the night, but joy comes in the morning.' I've really been learning about this lately and want to stamp it into my heart!

God has spoken to me a few times and each time, it's as if I heard it or read it and the info arrived in my brain via those means but without having audibly heard or read it. I will obtain the understanding as if I heard it or will see the letters in my brain. They are in complete sentences. Here are some things He told me: 1. 'The devil is using alcohol to get into your life.' 2. "God doesn't want you to read your horoscopes". (Both before I got saved). 3. 'Thewhitedove, EVERYTHING you tell me is precious!' (The tone was very, very encouraging and adamant) 4. A dream with dialogue: I was standing and a voice over my right shoulder said 3 things: 1. The Holy Spirit is protecting [husband's name] because of you. 2. Stop fixating how you're not spreading the Gospel enough and work on your relationship with Jesus first. 3. (I was shown a tsunami coming my way.) The voice said: 'The tsunami won't touch you'. When I woke up, my husband told me he had a change of heart over a very major decision over night. It turned out be very a very blessed decision!!!!Every time I panicked during this time, I remembered how the tsunami wouldn't touch me, and it didn't. 5.Recently I was asking God to stop a situation that I've found stressful. He said 'Endure just a little longer'. 6. Yesterday I went for a walk and prayed about the same thing and He said 'Everything is going to be fine. Hold on'. I've also had lots of dreams with no words as well as experiences with the Rhema word when the Scripture came alive.

I went out for a walk before I read this message and was praying about a current trial I'm going through. I clearly heard God say 'Everything is going to be fine. Hold on'. Then I asked Him to give me confirmation that this message really was from Him, and lo and behold, I get your message!

You dont understand how prophetic this message has been! @Neighbor

I would love to hear about periods of times in your life where there were challenges and things seemed bleak and confusing but you trusted God. What happened? What was the outcome? We know that he works all things for good for those who love Him. What did that look like in your life?

It's very tough but I'm trying to walk by faith and keep remembering that the best, most fertile compost comes from the crappiest, most putrid heaps of detritus. Anything that rots and decays is what disintegrates and becomes the most fruitful soil. I'm about to post a question on the main forum which I'm hoping will bring encouragement, depending on the responses. It will be called 'when you leaned not on your own understanding'.

I often feel the same. I just turn to God with everything. I often feel like walking away from the faith but the only thing that stops me is knowing that it's true. Jesus is Lord. I can't unknow what I know. I just cling on for dear life and trust that there's some point to it all somewhere and that God has got me, whether I feel it or not.

I know, because I lived in a Muslim country for 4 years and have Muslim friends, but again, the average Muslim is not a terrorist. I know that Islam at its heart is demonic and that Isis really are just living out the Quran. However, most Muslim people aren't blood thirsty and hell bent on destroying the infidel. They go through the motions of their faith, and pick out the bits that suits them and just try to get on with their lives.

I taught many children of Palestinian parents while living in the Middle East and honestly they are just normal people living their lives. To say they are all in Hamas is like saying all Irish people are in the IRA. Don't forget the Palestinian Christians who are caught in this too.

When I'm praying about a situation, I present my desired outcome to God and then say 'but Thy will be done'. I go about my business in the meantime. I don't wait for things to poof into existence and dont tend to pray for material things. What I have been asking God for, is a spiritual lift that I can't deny. A revelation, a change of heart, to feel His presence, to feel connected to Him. For something to change in my spirit in a way that I know him in my inner being and not just through head knowledge. I've read the Scriptures so much but I started wondering if I've fallen in love with a character in a book rather than the eternal, living God. Jesus sounds so great in the Gospels and its so cool to see him foreshadowed in the Old Testament and to hear Luke, Paul, Peter and John's accounts. But is Jesus real TO ME? No. That's the truth. He is a theory that I believe in, like gravity or photosynthesis, but it doesn't move me.

Not that I know of.

Fjk, I don't really understand. I want to feel a connection to Jesus and I can't. I've fasted, prayed, read the Bible, believed for everything I've prayed for but God still seems far away.

This is what I've been praying for and it hasn't happened.

Also, it's easier to forgive someone who had repented and asked for mercy AND who has turned to Christ, as that soldier had done.

I have a situation in my life where I keep forgiving the same person over and over. I keep having memories and have to keep forgiving each one. If our relationship was over I could look back and forgive her and move on, but I have a low contact relationship with her and there is always something that she does and I have to go through the process again. I watched Corrie Ten Boom a few weeks ago and she was an amazing lady. It has been an ongoing process. About 6 months ago, someone else treated me badly and honestly, I feel like I've used up all of my forgiveness on the other person. I just cannot dig deeply enough. I keep making the decision to forgive the second person and to let it go, again and again and I just don't have the strength. The second person reinforced the sense of unworthiness that the first person caused me through my life and together, these two people were too many to properly forgive. I keep trying to let go and make that choice! Really! It's so, so tiring.

And I don't even have it hard! I believe that I am saved because I believe that Jesus died for my sins and that he is Lord. I believe the Bible is true, but my heart had barely changed. I am still the same bitter, resentful, unforgiving, anxious person as before. My heart is hard. God has blessed me with an amazing life, great husband (unsaved but doesn't make things hard for me), 3 beautiful children, a great job,good health, talents. I have it all, but I've no peace. I've no joy. My life as a Christian feels cold and empty. I don't have a church which doesn't help, but I'm working on that. So cognitively,intellectually, I know that Jesus is the only waY, but there is no emotion attached to it. It feels almost like a ball and chain around my neck; I know the truth and can't unknow it so Im stuck with it. That's how it feels. Everything feels like a cliché. 'It's not about emotions'. OK, maybe but why do we have them, and it feels like a dry, depressing experience to chug along like a robot. This has been my default lately. 'You need to give thanks and worship'. OK, but when I do, nothing genuine comes out. It leaves me even colder. 'Ask God to change your heart'. I've been doing that for years. I'm still hard inside. 'Repent' I have done, several times. 'Get deliverence' i have prayed so many prayers to close any demonic doors and on the outside, my life is squeaky clean. The inside is still decrepit. 'Talk to an elder'. I spoke to my old pastor who told me to just focus on Jesus. Jesus seems far away from me. 'Spend more time in the Word'. I read a little every day and it's all I can stomach. To be honest, it all feels like something from Alice in Wonderland. One riddle after the other, one hoop to jump through after another. People keep saying how it's not works based, how Jesus did the work and that the Holy Spirit changes us. He hasn't changed me much. All I do is wrestle and wrestle and wrestle with my inner being, all the time. I am EXHAUSTED. I have been thinking about just walking away and living my life as I want. I desperately seek God's face and have been doing so since I got saved, and it's a constant radio silence. As I've said before, my earthly father is so loving and makes such an effort to tell me he loves me and show me he cares about me. He didn't just write me a book when I was born and go off and then tell me to look read it to get to know him, and then watch me on CCTV. And if I constantly cried out on the CCTV for him to get in touch in a way that felt real to me, that I could feel and understand, my biological father would do what I asked. 'Prayer isn't about getting what you want, it's about a relationship with God'. What relationship!!!!???? I feel.like I'm always getting scraps that just keep me going through each day and I have to try to talk myself into staying faithful. I want to walk away. How can I spread the Gospel or share the good news when I feel so depleted. I've been a Christian for 5 years and am still on milk. Raising my kids Christian feels like a burden, not a privilege. I feel so ill equipped. I am SICK, SICK, SICK of all of the platitudes. Will someone just be honest with me and stop pulling out the 'trust God' tropes. I believe in Him, but I don't know Him. I keep asking and asking g to know Him and it all seems to be on me and I can't figure it out. I'm crying as I write this as I'm just so depleted. I'm sorry, but I need something supernatural from Him. Who are you, God? Who am I to you? Why won't you reach out to me, into my heart? Change me? I'm so empty.

My mother didn't have her ears pierced but I wanted mine done, just because everyone has them done and I like earrings. I was 9 but they closed over, then I went again at 13