"Come out of the dark room"
Recently at church we have been having times dedicated to praying for healing. I went up to ask for prayer from my pastor and his wife on Sunday, for my health and also, on a deeper level, from my fears.
My pastor said he felt God was saying to me, "Come out of the dark room."
He said to me that he sensed that I was more at home than I have ever been before, but that I need to let go of things and fears which I have lived with for a long time. Fear of failure. Fear that my life hasn't turned out the way others hoped it would. Fear that I will struggle with depression for the rest of my life.
"Come out of the dark room," my pastor felt God was saying.
I have been thinking about this a lot. Talking with Dave about this, I have realised some things.
"Do you want to be made well?"
In John 5, Jesus encounters the man at Bethesda. This man has been an invalid, living amongst the blind, the lame and the paralysed, for 38 years. Before he heals him, Jesus asks, "Do you want to be made well?"
At first glance, this seems a no-brainer. Of course he wants to be made well. It's obvious!
But I have been thinking about this. This man has been an invalid for 38 years. 38 years. An unimaginably long time. He has spent his life as an invalid. This is what he knows. His income would have come from begging. His friends would have been others who lived around the Bethesda pool, rejects despised and shunned by society, fellow comrades struggling with him through the difficulties of being ill and looked down on in the worst possible way.
This was his life. He would have seen himself as an invalid. This was his identity.
So when Jesus asks this question, he is cutting through 38 years and getting to the core of this man's heart.
"Do you want to be made well?"
Are you ready to give everything up? Everything you know, everything you are?
For me?
Comfortable darkness
I don't know if many other people feel or know this, but sometimes it can be comfortable to be in the dark room.
When I say comfortable, I don't mean that it's enjoyable. I mean that there is a great deal of comfort from familiarity. If despair and exhaustion and depression are all you know, sometimes it is easier to live within their shadow than to move into the light. If it is part of your identity and who you are, it may never occur to you to let it go.
Dave told me about a bear that was held in captivity for many years, confined to a cage where all it could do was pace in a small square. When this bear was eventually and thankfully released back into the wild, it didn't know what to do with itself. For a long time it continued to pace in the exact same dimensions that it did in its cage.
After a lifetime of captivity, the chains that kept the bear subject had become part of its identity. It had to be challenged to break free of them.
The bear had to be taught how to live freely outside the cage.
Breaking the chains
When my pastor said "Come out of the dark room", and my husband reminded me of John 5 and this bear, I realised a few things about myself. Depression is a major part of my identity. The symptoms are the bane of my existence and my greatest fear. I hope and pray and worry about the struggles. It is by far the dominant force in my mind. But the truth is that it is a deep, deep part of me.
Many people forget that chains can bind you to other people. Depression has given me the capacity and understanding that has allowed me to love others more fully and more deeply. To understand, come alongside, and fight for others who are in pain and alone. I would not trade these lessons for anything.
During the service, I asked myself something. On a deeper level, a real, complex, soul level, did I want to be made well? Did I really want to be free from depression? Was I ready?
If I were completely healed from depression, would I be confused and at a loss? Would I feel that my mission was compromised? Would I have doubts about who I am?
My pastor had prayed that the chains of my fear and my depression and my past would be broken. The truth is that I have not prayed that prayer for many, many years. I had assumed that my depression would always be embedded deep inside me and I would never be free from it. That it served a purpose from God.
I had given up. I had given it a hold over me.
The man from Bethesda
The man from Bethesda is my soul brother. In him I see me and in me I see him.
I have struggled with depression since my earliest teens, which means that I have lived with it for over half of my life. It is really difficult for me to understand life without it, in the fullest, most complete sense. It is a part of my identity that I have not fully laid down to God.
Jesus asks me, "Do you want to be made well?"
Are you ready to give this up?
God tells me, "Come out of the dark room."
Step into the light of what I want for you.
Let go of the warmth, comfort and familiarity of the dark room. The dark room of how you think of yourself and your life. The memories of your past and what you think you deserve and are capable of. Your ideas of what you are here for and what you are capable of.
Follow me.
