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Edouard – My testimony
Caroline has a missionary call for Japan. And her path to understanding or accepting it is (without being easy) nicely rich.
Problem: I don’t feel anything similar. I don’t feel at all called to mission in general (at best I’m a strong supporter of “look at everything you can do here and now right next to you, instead of looking for the flattering adventure on the other side of the planet), nor specifically for Japan….
Second problem: for about a year now I have been facing depression again. The one you don’t get over with a good nap and a pat on the shoulder. Rather the kind that insidiously plunges you, over the course of 2-3 years of wear and tear through physical and emotional fatigue, into -violent- mental isolation, into a fragility that tries to defend itself almost only by anger, and tries to relieve itself – sometimes, too often – in alcoholic compulsions.
I’ve had to go through this before. And it took me 5 or 6 years at the time to get rid of it. Entire years. One after the other. Without seeing the end of it. Until the point where you think about choosing the end. And not the nice one.
But. At the end of strength, at the very edge of having not even the strength to live, you finally abandon any control on your self. And the Father finally can truly act. You beg him to. And HE reveals its giant glory. And when the sun rises, the sticky and burning tar, which wanted me dead, against which I was struggling with clumsy hysteria, is gone. With as much simplicity and lightness and softness as a deeply benevolent gaze…. Caring that continued to wean me, to heal me, along the necessary weeks and months and years that followed.
From this first – so long and painful – experience, I learned (a little) about the functioning of depression, its symptoms, its fertilizers and its catalysts. This allowed me to sound the alarm in just a few months, noting in December 2017 a drift that crossed a very dangerous line, for me and my family.
I also learned the weapons that help fight it, and with God’s help I was quickly able to realize the things within my reach that I could do to try to stop the fall. This surface and inner battle is at work, and is the challenge of my health, perhaps for years to come.
I also understood that severe depression is a pathology, which corrupts the mind, the spirit, even to the chemistry that carries it! Our thoughts, desires, vision, already not being spiritually perfect… In addition, depression robs you of your ambition, kills your motivation, and makes you lose sight of the horizon. It precludes me from projecting myself, from considering or building a will for the future.
Here’s where I come back to Caroline, to the mission, to Japan, to my feelings and to the Truth. The subject of Caroline’s will has long been a struggle, both inside and with (against) her. Among other things, the idea of being uprooted, when I feel like losing grip and when my only sense of stability is my home, was unbearable! And it is still a difficult topic to fight against today.
But considering what I know about depression and its impacts, I must humbly admit that it is not good to rely solely on myself, on my pondering, or my feelings (even if it turned out to be right at some moment about Caroline’s path). So I choose to look to God, to observe and aknwoledge what he sets up, to do my best to listen to what he wants to tell me. I accept to question what I do not feel for the mission or Japan, because my mind is not totally healthy, because it may not be completely well inspired, and so what I feel may simply not be the Truth… I accept to believe that for reasons I still don’t get, or that begin to draw their silhouette, or that I know well but cannot yet face them, I have allowed barriers, pollution, rebellions, lies, which block me from -or make me refuse to hear (listen) to- God’s voice and will for my life.
By His goodness, His – unbelievable – patience, His faithfullness, His generosity, His power, His authority, His relentless mercy, I stand, I stand firm, I grow and I move forward, little by little, even in the storm. The depression seems to be under control for more than a month now, and I’m going back up the slope, one day at a time, the best I can. By striving to not lose sight again of Jesus’ permanent and indestructible Victory over our corruptions.
And I feel that God is particularly patient and generous in the care he takes to transform my intelligence, and to gradually replace it with pieces of His knowledge, His wisdom.
So when the opportunity of 2 months in Japan through OM’s Taste Japan program appeared, I was able, despite the many thoughts still in conflict, to find peace there, and welcome the idea, not as a sacrifice, not as an obedience to Caroline’s call, but as part of a journey together. Not understanding it myself, God surely knew, Him, that I was at that moment finally ready for that opening.
I want to believe, I choose to believe, I know, that He knows much better than I do what is necessary, when, in what proportion, under what appearance, for what purpose, for what piece of path.
He knows better than anyone else if, when, how, why JAPAN SASTE, so His will be done, whatever it is, because it is good! 🙂
