Tomorrow can only be lived if you chose today, to be there tomorrow. The decisions today, can cause tomorrow to be less than what it could. Or tomorrow can be better because today, you chose well.
If you go into any forest or wooded area, you will find markings etched into trees. It might be markings or initials that people have carved into the trunk so that it remains forever. Today I want to share with you something that remains etched into my mind and heart. While God has beautifully healed this area of my life, the scars remain.
Nineteen years ago, my dad took his own life.
This week a want to use this blog to reach out and encourage others who have had a loved one who has taken their own life.
I also want to reach out to those that might be coming to the end of what they can take and might be thinking that life is not worth living, or that the pain that they feel needs to end. For you right now, please go and talk to someone – the future is yet to be lived and you will never know what that future is unless you experience it. I am praying for you right now and in the coming week.
The following story is an article I wrote a year ago, on the anniversary of my father’s passing. Some parts of it are raw and I have left it at that. God has used this part of my life to be able to reach others. I am not only grateful for pain, but thankful that we have a God who heals and then who allows us to use the pain for helping others.
(Be Alive Ministries Facebook post 29th March 2016)
https://www.facebook.com/notes/be-alive-ministries/it-is-etched-in-my-heart/616614411819443
For the one who has lost the will to live
There is always a tomorrow.
Tomorrow remains as a forward destination whether we want it to be or not. If we end our tomorrows, it is still there for everyone else. People who are at the end of what they can take, or when the depression fills the mind with darkness, then the existence of tomorrow is wanting to be wiped from the now. Tomorrow is not always as we think it might be. When pain or darkness speak, it does not tell the truth. It speaks from yesterday, not tomorrow.
The future is always there. It is what we do tomorrow that changes this.
As a Christian, I have faced times were the only hope for a future was hanging on to God, until the tomorrow was then today and today was better. Soon the “todays” became the best place to be and my “tomorrows” were left in the hands of the very God who I had clung to.
I only can say that my father missed out on so much, because he chose to wipe his tomorrows away. He chose not to understand that the God he believed in would get him through, and tomorrow, while maybe different and challenging, was worth the fight.
Every person, life and tomorrow is worth the fight, it is worth the decision to live another day. It is worth hanging on to God while He brings your though.
I have been in both situations. I have thought of no tomorrow and I have lost someone who thought that there was no tomorrow. For this I can personally say without a doubt in my heart – whatever the struggle, God is the answer.
For the one who has lost a loved one to suicide
You have a tomorrow too. It is hard and painful, you will be angry and then regret that anger. You will wonder if you could have done more. You will blame yourself and then blame your loved one. You will have good days and bad days. My heart goes out to you.
Your life is now different, someone has changed that for you. Your tomorrow will only change too if you make the decisions to start every day as a new one. Remember what I said above. When pain and darkness speak, it does not tell the truth.
Forgive, surround yourself with friends and loved ones, and give your tomorrow to God. He knows your future and can help you.
I know this. I have experienced this. Our God is an awesome God. He takes our dark todays and turns them in to tomorrows of worth and a future of hope.
There is a lesson I have learnt well – God knows my yesterday. He is with me today. He is in my tomorrow, and He is my forever. I know this becasue I have experienced this. I have a bush in my yard, it is called “Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow”. When I see this bush, I think of God. God has been there for me for so many years, and I look forward to the years to come.
Tomorrow isn’t ours to deal with today. We can only deal with one day at a time. Yesterday cannot be dealt with today either, it belongs in the past.
Give your yesterdays, todays and tomorrows to God. Trust in Him who has a better sight than you.
Be blessed
Australia
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