A bad day… verses God encouraged me with

I have not felt at all well today. I have had some unexpected demands on my energy yesterday and woke up feeling dreadful and so unable to do my usual work or schedule. When my energy is bad I have a big battle in my head with depression especially when on my own for hours on end.

This afternoon has dragged on. I have eaten when I didn’t need to out of boredom and feeling down. I decided to watch some TV as I rationalised that I was too tired to read my Bible and I could not think of anything else to do with UCB (a Christian radio station) on. I flicked between trashy rubbish for about an hour and felt worse than I had before.

I started to pray and asked God how I was any use to anyone in this state. I told him that surely I was glorifying him more when I could interact with people or work. I asked him how long this would last.

I did then pick up my Bible and started picking out some familiar verses and not worrying about getting through my Bible reading. God first reminded me of the verse in Exodus 14:14: ‘The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.’ I thanked God that he is always fighting for me regardless of how I feel and asked him to give me his peace. I then flicked to Psalm 91 and read the first verse:  ‘Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty’. I was drawn to the word dwell and asked God to help me to dwell in his presence today and to rest in him. I then read the second verse: ‘I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’ I simply read this and thanked God for it. I was too fatigued to go any further but I felt like a weight has been lifted. It gave me strength for what remained of a long afternoon before my family came home.

I wish I had gone to scripture sooner when feeling awful mentally and physically today, something that I often find hard and disqualify myself from because I think my fatigue is too bad or because of a lack of motivation to do anything. Mental health is hard and just because you are a Christian doesn’t mean you are immune to it. However I am so encouraged that the Bible is the living word of God and he knows what we need in each moment of our lives both good and bad. We need to give God a chance to speak to us through his word. I hope this encourages you to grab your Bible in the moments you feel terrible and not turn to worldly solutions such as TV or food.