Sometimes we need professional help. I have been doing this for many years. Don’t play with suicidal thoughts. Seek council. Call me. Call a friend. Call a doctor. Get off unprescribed drugs. Get on the prescribed, if needed. I can’t tell you more any stronger. God’s help first came to me in a mental institution.
Some of us have been taken so far down by our emotions and mental states of mind that it seems there is no way out but suicide. I’ve been there.
I was in debt up to my gills. My business was failing. I had six businesses that failed before this episode. I had bills that I couldn’t pay. I walked around in a daze struggling in all sorts of difficulty, distress, and embarrassment from which I could not remove myself. There were allegations against my character when all I wanted was to do right.
If you are contemplating suicide, take the option off the table. Instead, go somewhere that you can be alone. Get on the knees of your heart and scream. Direct your screams toward all your troubles. Yell to them, “you are not going to win this war!” Use your anger and fear to call out each one of your problems by name; bills, loss of employment, kids in trouble, your spouse is abusive. Whatever.
When I was in my van, parked remotely on a Walmart parking lot in Desoto, Texas, screaming my lungs out in despair, crying, and beating my hands and head against the steering wheel, saying, and swearing, “God help me.” I cursed His blessed name and existence. Convincingly, I blamed Him for my wretched state of being, but it didn’t work.
In those moments of frantic anguish and despair, fighting against the thought of suicide, it came down to ultimately acknowledging God, even in the cursing. I had directed my curses toward Him and asked Him for help in the same breath.
All my problems ended in a single moment on the Walmart parking lot in Desoto TX when I had finally put God first, as ugly as the attack on Him was. I am not saying God put the stamp on the envelope, addressed and mailed it. I am saying that exactly now when I acknowledged Him, the fear and anger left me. I was able to collect myself in a trembling way and go on back to the office where the work was done.
All God wants from us is to put Him first.
Magnificently, God revealed the miracle he had performed.
I was 12 years sober. A man I knew in AA called me one morning at 6 AM. He asked me what I was doing. I told him that I was in early to begin closing the business down and let go the help. He said, “Cary, don’t close it down, I’ll buy it.” He paid me enough to pay the workers their due, kept them employed, took over the lease of the office and shop, and the lease of the equipment.
It was still not a bed of roses, but a big step happened in my life. I was seeing God in action. I saw that He in fact did have a plan for me to prosper in the years to come. If you didn’t catch it, God sent the man who helped me out of a jamb.
All God wants from us is to put Him first.
The culture today spends most of its time leaning on, working from, and making decisions out of its own understanding. Unless our own understanding is the ways of God, we will not go very far. Our wisdom is frail and weak. God’s wisdom is strong and powerful. Even the most powerful men of finance have troubles that the man living under a bridge is free from. Bridge men have other mental illnesses. Heck, we all have something. Right?
One person reading this may be considering suicide. I am not a miracle worker, but God is. I am not a psychologist or a psychiatrist. I do not have a degree in biblical studies, but you and I both can read what the good book says. I have been where you are, and God brought me through. He will bring you through. The Bible is full of wisdom and comforting prayers.
There is one or more of you who can’t grasp the idea that there is a God in heaven, as well as those who are Christian and do not follow His ways. In both categories the people are lost in the ways of the world and have lost what it means to have hope. Fretting is not the same thing as hope. Wishing is not hope.
You can find out. God will prove himself to you if you take one obedient step. It can be anything as small as honor your mother and father, train your children in the way they should go, respect your husband, love your wife, it can be anything that is right. Can you see how this is going? Doing these obedient acts of kindness is taking you out of thinking always about yourself. These are not earthshattering acts, but they will shake up your world if you follow them, day by day, moment by moment. These acts are right out of the Santa Biblia (Holy Bible).
Suicide is putting yourself first. Go now, run, kick, scream, plead, cuss, and yell to Him. He can handle you just the way you are. You can short cut the kicking and screaming by taking simple steps that you know is already right. Don’t worry about the bills.
My first act of obedience was tithing 10% off the gross of my income. Things changed for me financially when I gave to God what I loved most, His money. He gave back His love, the fruit of the Holy Spirit.
Don’t go to the bottle first, narcotics, or porn. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.” Don’t even wait until you get to church this week. Seek Him first and you are already found.
Cary John Efurd is CEO of Cary John Efurd Ministries. You can contact Cary at caryefurd@gmail.com or call / text 214.240.9198. You can purchase his new book Road to Recovery / to L and Back on amazon.com or his website caryjohnefurdministries.com. They are also available at Smith Furniture in Pittsburg, TX. All proceeds go to help people in need.