News update:

http://www.philstar.com/health-and-family/2014/09/09/1367141/who-someone-commits-suicide-every-40-seconds

http://www.philstar.com/health-and-family/2015/07/08/1474681/look-suicide-rates-around-world-one-map

Robin Williams’s suicide on the news was a shock. What a deep and tragic loss.  It seemed he had everything to live for… It’s hard to say from the outside who is okay and who isn’t.

A few years ago, I had a fellow parent. She looked fine; no reason to think why she wouldn’t be.  Her child was doing very well in school.  There was no indication of other issues awry.  One day, I bumped into her and she confessed that she was so depressed just a few days prior that she climbed to the roof deck of her condo and contemplated jumping to the ground to end her misery.  Praise God, she felt like her feet got locked somehow and she came to her senses before she could jump.  (By God’s grace that woman has since come to know the Lord and is well.)

At that time, I couldn’t figure out what could bring a person to such desperation… until I went through my own painful experience three years ago.  Then I caught glimpses of the moments when logic gets blurred, the spurts of patchy slumber as the few-and-far-between morsels of comfort that getting out of gives way to the flood of overwhelming pain and anguish.   Question in mind was:  Is there a way to just disintegrate into thin air and float around camouflaged like dust, weightless and careless?  That was then.

I would like to share what I learned in case you or anyone you know may benefit from this…

What to do when thoughts of desperation exceed their welcome in the mind and heart?  Arm yourself wiith truths you can rely on.  God’s Word is Truth, the word of life that shows us the way out of the pit.

John 17:17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.

People’s desperation is Satan’s delight.  Oh how Satan would celebrate for every soul lost.  He aims to steal your joy, kill your hope, destroy your future. He just comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Period.   Here are some of God’s truths to debunk Satan’s lies. There’s much more where these came from…

7 Truths to Remember:

1. God’s plan is to prosper you, not to harm you, but to give you a hope and a future.

2. You are so preciously loved.

3. Whatever you are going through is not permanent; there is an end to crying and pain.

4. God is greater than whatever you are going through.

5. If you give your pain to God and allow Him to write the rest of your story, He will cause all things, including the worst that have happened,  to work for good.

6. He wants, invites, asks you to come to Him with your pain and He will give you rest; God will renew your strength if you put your hope in Him.

7. When you follow God’s way, you don’t have to fear people, what they think, or say. 3 Things to Try If You Have Considered Ending Your Life:

In so many words, just count yourself dead already.   You don’t need to kill yourself.  Just consider yourself dead.

Romans 6:11 11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

1.  You don’t need to die physically.  Try just dying to your FLESH. The “flesh” is our sinful, selfish nature that needs to gratify itself… like a baby that must have what it wants.  Now.  When our flesh is the boss of us (to borrow Malcolm in the Middle’s concept), we become slaves to it; the fulfillment of what we want at this moment is the most important pursuit .  We cannot delay gratification.  We have no threshold for pain, waiting, or self-denial.  We don’t want to endure suffering so we want it to end. Now.

Dying to self is sometimes referred to as having a circumcision of the heart, riddance of unnecessary flesh. It means dying to pride. Go ahead, kill your pride. kill your lust, anger, unforgiveness, bitterness, rage, self-centredness.  Kill idolatry… when something or someone becomes so  important that when it is taken away, we want to end our lives.  Kill the lies of the enemy that tell you you have no purpose, that you are all alone, that no one loves you, that the current devastating situation is permanent and it will define you.  No, this situation is not going to define you but instead, just refine you to be your better self.  Go back to God’s Truths. First and foremost, that there is a good God who is for you.  Kill all the wrong thoughts and attitudes but don’t kill yourself.  I encourage you to run your race of life to the finish.

Romans 8:13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.

2.   Try dying to control.  Instead, turn over the control of your life to God.

The enemy, Satan, would have us focus on the changing temporal circumstance than the reality that God is above all. Thoughts of suicide probably come as a result of feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, and futility to change one’s situation in the way that the person wants when the expectation is opposite of the current temporary reality.  When we think that we can control everything, we are setting ourselves up for major disappointment.  We are constantly trying to fix things and people and situations the way we want.  Recognizing that God is wiser, more able, for us instead of against us, ever present without taking naps, and that He will do a better job of taking over, we are enabled to rest in Him and give the reigns  of our lives over to Him.

To submit is to  accept or yield to a superior force or to the authority or will of another.  It is to understand that our lives are not our own, that we are mere stewards of what we have been given, that if God is our Boss, then we are to surrender to Him and please Him.  If God is Boss, then He should have the last say.  Even our emotional decisions would yield to God’s authority.

James 4:7  Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

3.  Try crucifying yourself only spiritually and then allow the life of Christ to manifest in you.  

If you have pictured inflicting pain on yourself to end your life, try just crucifying your will to God and in everything, ask, “What would Jesus do?” Then you would love the unloveable, forgive the unforgivable,  obey God even when you are dying inside (figuratively) from difficulty, endure suffering, be thankful even in times of lack even in times of imminent trial even in times of sorrowful circumstances, give glory to God by finishing the work God gave you to do.

Gal 2:20   I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Jesus loves you so much that He died for you regardless of what you have done. You can start afresh.  He did not come to condemn you but to save you.  He knows what it is like to be overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.  He understands you.  Jesus has come that you may have life and have it to the full. In God, you are an overcomer, more than a conqueror.

Below are the source verses of what Jesus read in the synagogue to describe His  ministry to heal you, to free you, to comfort you, to provide for you, to trade in your despair and mourning for joy and praise, to rebuild and restore what was devastated, to remove your shame and instead give you a double portion, to remove disgrace and give you joy.  Be blessed!  Jesus came so that instead of death, you may have life and have it to the full!

The Year of the Lord’s Favor