My Hope

 

It’s coming up on September and for the last few years something I have looked forward to in this month is the walks, fundraisers, and media attention that it gets from being the Suicide Prevention Awareness month.  Mental health issues and suicidal ideation are unfortunately something my immediate and extended families deal with all too often.  It is truly the worst thing that I can think of that any soul will ever have to deal with. 

I believe hope is one of the key factors in surviving it.  Maybe it's hope in what the future may hold.  Maybe it’s in having hope that your family still needs you.  Maybe it's hope that a new medication or therapy might work.  These “hopes” work for some people and I’m grateful they do but do you want to know what hope looks like for me?  I have a hope in something that not everyone believes in.  That is their choice, and while this may sound dramatic, this hope is a matter of life or death for some people dealing with mental health issues.  That hope is in a future day when our bodies are resurrected and not just physically made perfect but, most importantly to me at least, our minds are made whole.

Psalms 31:12 and 34:18 says, “I am like a broken vessel…The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart…”  Often when we speak of love or things we truly believe in or even when hurting, we refer to our heart.  After reading that scripture I couldn’t help but relate it to mental health or the "heart" as our minds. Then I thought about the word nigh.  It's as if something is close but not quite where you are.  I don’t know how many times I have heard people who suffer from depression or anxiety say that when they are at their lowest, it’s hard to feel the Spirit.  There are some interesting studies done on the parts of the brain that are activated when having a spiritual experience vs. depression.  Needless to say, when I learned this, the hope that I lean on is even more relevant.

But I also know that these things that I deeply struggle with are also what made me, me.  I beat myself up for all that I lack just like anyone else but if I could give myself one compliment, it would be my ability to sense sadness in others.  And I ache for them at times.  Enough that I am willing and have often done my very best to help them in their times of need.    I am by far, not perfect in this but I can honestly say that I really do try harder in this than in most things in my life.

So if mental health issues are a huge part of what made me, me and I have faith in a Father in Heaven who loves me no matter what, that must mean that he loves “broken” things like spoken of in Psalms.  A dear friend, Rose Rowberry, sent me a quote today from a book that she is reading.  I read it several times and knew I had to journal about this subject today.  Jeffrey R. Holland said,

“Sometimes the events of life can damage our highest hopes and dreams.  Some of our sweetest possessions and most cherished ideals end up being bruised, and sometimes they are broken…It may be that among all the broken things God loves, He loves a broken heart most of all.”  After speaking of examples of broken things that actually end up leading to nourishment and growth he said, “…through the great miracle of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, He will give your heart back to you healed and whole.  That is the ultimate truth taught by the Resurrection.  Christ, the Great Healer, will make recompense for us in time and in eternity.  By His grace and the goodness of God, all broken vessels are fully repaired.”

I have made this entry long enough so I will just end it with something else this wise men once testified of.  Elder Holland’s testimony is that of my own hope that I lean on.  “I bear witness of that day when loved ones whom we knew to have disabilities in mortality will stand before us glorified and grand, breathtakingly perfect in body and mind. What a thrilling moment that will be! I do not know whether we will be happier for ourselves that we have witnessed such a miracle or happier for them that they are fully perfect and finally “free at last.”  Until that hour when Christ’s consummate gift is evident to us all, may we live by faith, hold fast to hope, and show “compassion one of another,” I pray, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.”