If you experience suicidal thoughts, the following post could be potentially triggering. You can contact the Crisis Text Line by texting “START” to 741741.If you need support right now, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255, the Trevor Project at 1-866-488-7386, or reach the Crisis Text Line by texting “START” to 741741.

 I’ve been in a serious relationship with God since 1999. I had grown up in church but up until then, I had zero revelation of who God was other than someone I needed to receive and obey so I didn’t go to hell. I had never heard about having a relationship with God. The concept was foreign to me…nonexistent. 

I grew up in an environment where the Holy Spirit or rather the “Holy Ghost” was more of something you “experienced or caught” on Sunday on a really good song. But He wasn’t known to me as the third person of the trinity that dwelled within me and wanted a relationship with me. He wasn’t known as my teacher, guide, comforter, or friend. The Holy Ghost was just something I could never seem to catch or grasp a hold of. At this time in my life, I was at the height of my depression and anxiety. And I was searching. I had started attending every after-church program or bible class I could make it to. But nothing quite gave me the answer to what I was looking for. We were singing about a healer that I couldn’t experience and about an unspeakable joy that I didn’t have. So either this is all just a bunch of hoopla and God was a liar or what I was looking for wasn’t where I was. God had to be bigger than this. There had to be more to this…this certainly was not it. So I left.

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During those four years, I was still searching. But my search for God was being overcome by depression. I was losing jobs, relationships, and friendships. Everything in my life seemed to be coming apart at the seams. So it was then on a Sunday in July 1999 that I decided this was IT! I was going to die.

 I waited until my mother, sister-in-law, and niece had left for church. I want to say that it was the first Sunday my mom had been back to church since her cancer diagnosis and chemo treatments. I was home alone. I waited a while after they left and then went downstairs to get a concoction of pills out of my mother & brother’s rooms. They had all sorts of prescription narcotics for pain and other medicine readily available right on their dressers. So I poured a few from each bottle into my hands, grabbed a glass of water from the kitchen, and went up to my room to do the deed. This time, there wasn’t going to be a call coming from my special friend to stop me. He was gone. This time it was just me and my way out!

I didn’t write a letter. I figured my journals would be more than enough for them to know why I had to go. So I started taking the pills. There were no tears and eerily enough no fear. I just sat on my bed placing pill after pill on my tongue and calmly washed them down with water. I was halfway through my handful of pills when I heard someone call my name. And then clear as a bell I heard Him say, “Would you give me another chance?” It was then that the tears began streaming down my face. I knew that voice and I knew my answer.

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A few weeks prior, I had this weird experience. I was in my room laying in my bed in the middle of the day. My mom and I were home alone. As I was laying there I heard someone call my name. So I rolled out of bed and went to her room and stood in the doorway.

“Did you call me?” I asked.

“No, I didn’t call you.”

“Oh, I thought I heard someone call my name.” She looked at me as if to say “well it wasn’t me.” So I shrugged it off and went back upstairs to lie down. A few minutes later, as clear as a bell. I hear someone call my name again. So I went downstairs and stood in the doorway and asked, “Did you call me?”

“No,” she replied.

“I keep hearing someone call my name.”

“That must be God trying to get your attention. The next time you hear him call your name just say yes, Lord.”

I stood there looking like “Okay.” And then she proceeds to tell me the story of Samuel and Eli which I don’t think I had ever heard before or just didn’t remember. So I went back upstairs and laid down again. But I didn’t get the third call as Samuel did that day. Instead, I would get that third call as I was halfway through taking a handful of pills to end my life.

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As the tears streamed down my face I fell to my knees on the floor. In the midst of my tears, I heard Him say to me turn on the radio. So I crawled over to the radio and hit the power button. And this is what I heard:

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All I can say is that by the end of that song I had finally encountered who I had been desperately searching for. And from that moment forward, I began a relationship with God and I’ve been diligently following Him ever since.

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Yeah…I can’t make stuff like this up! But over the past 20+ years, God continues to show up in my life in ways that I can’t even explain other than to say it’s just Him. It’s His unique and divine signature upon my life!

So that’s my testimony. I believe God wanted me to share this story because He wants you to know that His hand is upon your life. He has predestined your future and given purpose to your life. He loves you so much that He will go to great lengths to show you just how much He loves you and desires to be in a relationship with you. He doesn’t just want to be Lord & Savior, He wants to be your Father, your Comforter, and your Friend. And all you have to do my dear friend is surrender your heart to him.

I am grateful for the time we’ve had to walk together today! But do me a favor If you know someone who is experiencing depression or that you haven’t heard from in a while and God puts it on your heart to reach out….reach out and don’t hesitate. You never know how much that phone call or text could mean to the person on the other end of the line.

Until next time, Be Well…and know that God loves you more than you can ever imagine!

Smooches…