Faith and Doubt
By Tonya King
I remember a time a few years into managing my Bipolar Disorder that I began to suffer from debilitating anxiety. I know that anxiety is a component to many mental illnesses as well as being a diagnosis all on its own, but this anxiety was different than what I had been experiencing. This anxiety went deep. I could not go out of the house, I could not think straight, I was afraid of everything and most everyone. This anxiety had led itself into ice cold fear. It gripped me and was holding on for dear life as I was holding onto God for dear life. My Doctor changed my medicine…no help. I went to more therapy sessions…again, no help. What was I going to do?
Well, I went and spoke to the one who could rescue me, my only hope, God. I would spend hours
reading my Bible and praying, but not really listening. I would ask God over and over as to what was going on. What was causing this anxiety? But, I was not listening for the answer. I was to spun up with my problem to get calm before God to hear what He had to say. One night, I was laying with my face in the carpet just crying out to God to please help me and then I heard Him loud and clear. “ You do not trust me to help you”. “You feel that your anxiety is to great for me to heal”. No… that cannot be God saying that. I trust you God. But I didn’t. I thought I was trusting God 100%, but I had doubts. “Could God heal this, or would God heal this”?
I had to do some real soul searching. Why did I ask God to heal my anxiety when I doubted that He would? Sounds a bit double-minded. Well, it was. I asked but didn’t expect. I had very little faith that I would ever feel better. This is the troubling mindset people with mental illnesses can get into. We think there is no hope. Nothing will ever make us feel better. This dark time will be with me always, I’ll never again see the light. That is an attitude of worry run amok and at times, we wallow in it until it has covered every inch of us all the way up to our ears.
But the word of God says differently. God promises to heal us. In Psalm 147:2 it says
He heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds”
We need to stand on these promises and expect God to keep them. He is ever faithful and knows what we need before we even ask. So, I began to repeat these verses on healing and within a weeks’ time, my anxiety had left. Was it because God decided to answer my prayers…maybe, but I believe it was because I started to expect and believe for my healing. I replaced doubt with belief in the promise God made to me and my situation changed.
At times, my anxiety reaches levels I thought to be impossible but when my illness becomes problematic for me, I immediately turn to God in prayer and Scripture reading along with meditation. I know that if I fill my mind with the things of God, my anxiety, or depression or mania does not have as much room in my mind to take up residence. We all have our “somethings” to deal with. We all suffer from a lack of faith from time to time, but do not ever doubt the promise that God wants to heal you and never give up the hope that one day he will. Anxiety is real, mental illness is real, but God is real as well and He is in charge. Do not give your illness more power than it deserves. God is bigger. Believe.
Tonya King is a writer, speaker, and Mental Health Coach. She is the founder of Faith in the Midst ministries which is a ministry devoted to the healing and wholeness of mental illnesses through faith in Jesus Christ
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