Rising on Eagles' Wings

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 

I will fear no evil: 

for thou art with me; 

thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

-Psalm 23:4 (KJV)

I have been repeating this line over and over in my head for the past few weeks.

When I was six, I was left alone for a little while as my mother went up the street to check on my older brothers. I noticed and smelled smoke. My mom accidentally left the stove on. As I frantically tried multiple options to get out of the house unsuccessfully, I realized that my only real option in order to save myself and my home was to go to the kitchen, where the fire and the smoke had originated. I realized that I had to go to the worst room to be in at the time. I went to the kitchen, turned a trash can over, stepped on top of it and called 911 just in time.

Right before my most recent hospitalization, I was having memories flashing through my head at all hours of the day. Many people say that before they pass away, their whole “life flashes before their eyes.” It was like that, but it was not flashes. It was constant videos of both good and bad times in my life and it was uncontrollable. I had memories from as early as three years old and they were extremely vivid.

Sometimes what it takes to move forward and heal from traumatic experiences is to go back to where it all started. Sometimes it takes going back to the deepest and darkest parts of our lives. Sometimes it takes coming face to face with the events in our lives that we never wanted to think about.

For most of my life, I have held everything in because that was the only way I really felt that I could move forward. People are usually shocked when I tell them even some of the stuff that I have dealt with at the surface level. I learned early on that I had to pretend that everything at home was fine when it really was not.

This is a completely different stage of my life though. I know that if I really want to move forward and save my life, I need to come to terms with everything I have gone through. Because I have gone through so much, these few months have been very overwhelming. In fact, having the flooding memories so intensely led me to become catatonic during my last hospitalization. I did not eat, sleep or talk for two days.

But I am still here. I am more ready than ever to cope with everything in my life. I am ready to find the answers to the questions I have always wondered, the questions I've held deep inside my soul. I am ready to move forward in a way that I have never moved forward before.

More importantly, God is with me as I “walk through the valley of the shadow of death.” When you and I walk through those deep, dark places in our lives, He walks with us. He never leaves us nor forsakes us. There is not one second of our lives where God is not there guiding us, loving us, providing for us, helping us cope, and strengthening us.

Without God, I can definitely say that I would not be the person I am today. Without the struggles I've faced in my life, I would not be the person I am today. In some ways, I’m thankful for some of the struggles I have faced. I would not be as strong as I am today. I think that through our obstacles, God gives us a lot of wisdom.

As I am going through this very challenging process of delving deep into the dark parts of my past, I have realized that those moments are dead to me. But God is breathing new life into those moments. He is showing me how He helped me get through all of my obstacles. He is showing me where He was in the situation, something I have wondered a lot. He is showing me that even though I felt like He was absent, He was there. He is showing me that He never stopped loving me, even through the moments that I felt like nobody loved me. He is showing me that He gave me and continually gives me the strength I need to go through everything. Through Him, I am becoming a new person.

"Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: 

old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."

-2 Corinthians 5:17 (KJV)

Many people know that one of my favorite animals is the eagle. One of the main reasons is because I found out that eagles wait for a storm. They feel the winds and then once the storm comes, they use the winds of the storm to rise above the storm. In the same way, I have tried to use those difficult times, the turmoil inside my mind, body and spirit, to rise above everything that I have ever had to face. Sometimes we need to go through the "windy" parts of our lives before we truly can move forward. Sometimes it feels like we are being tossed all around, but God holds us even in those moments. Through Him, we are standing on a firm foundation even in those moments.

I will leave you with one of my favorite songs that speaks about rising on eagles’ wings…