angels and demons | ponytail and boots

Restless yet trusting

Posted on May 12, 2015 by tigerhart

Can life get any worse? I am sure it can. The poorest of the poor get hit with another earthquake, Christians lose their lives for holding to the testimony of the Lamb, sweet babies fall into the arms of Jesus too soon for us still left here on earth. But for me it this is a time of sweetness but as it goes down it becomes bitter and gives you an upset stomach.

The sweetness comes from hanging onto the cross , running into random Christians who fix your direct tv, having bible study with Monday night tribe and seeing God answer prayers; the bitter…..pain of a mothers broken heart. When your child , no matter the age, comes down with a disease it is life changing. When there is no cure and it comes with social stigma it is even worse. Making hard decisions that make you second guess your plan, your motives , what is best for all and still wishing you could fix it right now; it also makes you question what is the right path to treatment causing a deep deep groaning in your spirit and soul.

Knowing that Christ is interceding on my behalf and my familie’s life brings comfort. But if you asked me what life I would want to have I would choose this difficult one over and over again. I don’t think I could honestly say that in the past. When life is easy , when you don’t have trouble or struggle you never get to exercise faith. If things just go smooth according to your own dream plan you never need to pray or ask God the hard questions. You can just assume all is well and you are blessed because life is smooth.

Mine is not, never has been. It is a true path of struggle , pain, sin, shame, and one that must be lighted by the word of God. I have had a hard time living my own personal path when I keep comparing my life to others. I have known people who cruise through life , they are Christians for sure, but their path is not a curvy up and down steep mountain drop off a cliff kind of path. Theirs is a straight road with the wind blowing in their hair and laughter all the way home to Jesus. I used to be jealous. I used to want that life and wonder why God loves them more than me to bless them with such a families that never break down.

But I am set free from that. I have seen people suffer more than me and still love God. I believe God made me to live in this time and have these kids and this husband. My family needs each of us to stand in the gap for such a time as this. I now embrace where the Lord is taking me. I even know He uses my sin to foil the plans of the devil. I can’t out sin His grace and I don’t want to. I don’t want to covet a life that is not mine. I am not bored ( laughing at that word) and I am in deep pain but my God has a bigger plan. He sees from a far and knows what needs to be Knit together and then puts me where I need to be. So just when I thought peace was here we get hit with news of ours sons brain disease. I still have hope and love. I will borrow that phrase from my sweet and dear sister in Christ, Mary, who lost her son last week. HOPE AND LOVE. I want my life. I want this beautiful mess I want to walk where others fear to go, I want to shout at the enemy and watch him leave as I submit to God. I want to be a part of this unperfect family that I Love so much. We may not be smiling all the time, we may not even have a thing to smile or laugh about but we will anyway. So when you see us don’t judge , you don’t know what path God has for us. What He needs to do from past generations to move us forward with new generations. But I am finally free to let it go and carry on. Yes I am a beautiful mess, I may not look beautiful or act “Christian” enough for some but my love for Christ grows daily and my trust and faith in His plan is growing deep roots so I may weather this storm and those to come. When I am weak He is strong. So let me be weak , let my fragile family be weak for He has a plan and it is specific to us.

Peter was so concerned about what Jesus said about John that he had to be rebuked by Christ. Jesus said “what is it to you Peter if John doesn’t die?” ” you follow me and where I want you to go “. I wants this life that causes me to cling to faith as I ride along the side of a curvy steep path along the edge of a cliff because it is here that I can only trust my maker. I would never call on him along a straight easy smooth road , I would trust in myself and think “I got this”. So God , thanks for knowing me better, thank you for all the beautiful messes because I know that is how you are crafting me into the likeness of your son. I am humbled you still love me and I believe in miracles. Just thank you Lord. I surrender

Sounds of Silence-thoughts in a broken mind

Posted on April 16, 2015 by tigerhart

Hello darkness, my old friend,
I’ve come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

This song seemed appropriate to listen to as I left the behavioral health facility after another visit to see my son. The noise in my son’s mind must be unbearable. His drugs are dosed way too high. But then again when one gets thrown into a stabilization facility and they don’t know you and you are not yourself they simply start guessing. The problem is the human condition is fluid. Not everyone is static. One drug may work in miniscule amounts or not at all. My son was off all meds and we were all told nothing was wrong 9 months ago. We took him off everything according to this doctor, I wrote about it in a previous blog. We chose to believe him. It was nearly impossible to think this Psychiatrist was right, but we did as he prescribed and took him off all meds. For 9 months my son was as right as rain, as normal as he could be considering all he has been through. I will still choose hope and belief. What else am I left with? At a meeting I tried to attend I was told the sooner I get over my denial and accept his illness, the sooner I can heal and move on. Call me stubborn , but I am content to live in denial and pursue hope and healing. I just can’t give it all up, I am not ready, I may never be ready. This battle is ongoing and we had some rest and relaxation for 9 months, but the enemy is back. I know I am supposed to be all scientific, but I just refuse. I have a body, a mind, a soul and a spirit. My soul is where my will and my emotions live and my mind plays a part with that soul and also with my body. But my spirit? Yep ,it has a part to play also. It is where faith lives. All humans have faith-they simply put their faith into different values and ideas. Some have faith in Jesus, who claimed to the be the son of God and was crucified for His statement of Godhood. I am one of those who believe He really was son of God and really was crucified and then on the third day He was resurrected and defeated death for my sins, my inability to live a perfect life. Some have faith that there is no God, or faith in themselves, or faith in the universe or a doctors diagnosis.

Mental health is too complex to leave to one aspect of the entire human condition. He needs His spirit to be filled and protected, he needs his mind to calm down and stop racing and shut down ( drugs can really help here), his soul needs nourishment to know and realize he is loved and safe and his body needs sleep, good nutrition , exercise and in his case NO ILLICIT DRUGS. It is like he is allergic to them. They open something up inside him and out comes strange ideas, movements and paranoia. What is interesting is that his symptoms are like so many others. I mean literally. Same script, same words, same attacks, same voices……how can that be? I can understand diabetics having the same symptoms because their organs pretty much work the same in everyone’s body in the same way, or in their case they don’t work. But mental health? How can symptoms cross cultural, racial, socioeconomic barriers? Even religious barriers? The more I read accounts the more I see my son in other’s books. Same signs, symptoms, voices, gestures, etc. So I know the brain is doing something chemically, from some cause ( drugs seem to be a trigger) and almost all people lack insight that something is wrong. Their brain literally tells them the wrong signal. It seems intentional, like an enemy force put the play into action in their brains, that the enemy was able to get inside and send signals to fire in the brain for them to say the same things, act the same way, use vulgar language, become super strong, see the same figures…..How can this be? It has to be spiritual.

I do believe in a spirit world, because I believe the bible. It talks a lot about messengers or as we call them angels. Most Americans believe in angels, but not fallen angels. I do, and not just because of the bible but because I have seen their work. Like a portal opens and they have permission to come in and prey on a person in their weakest area. They would know, they are assigned to each person. God , in the psalms says each person has guardian angels ( messengers from God) so that is at least two messengers. If I were the enemy I would send at least one to frustrate the plans of God. And since they have been around longer than all of us they would know all our weaknesses, hear our self talk in the silence when we are alone, and they would know all the generations prior to us; what they did, what their weakness were or their ‘bents’. They could easily have a way in and I believe unforgiveness, rejection, drug addiction, occultic practices can be portals for them to come in. I am sure I have lost a lot of you by now. Everyone would like it to be a scientific curable problem, but it isn’t. And the truth is it is growing and the system is broken and most end up in a vicious cycle of hospital, release, counsel, rejection of meds, back to ER, then to hosp for stabilization and all over again. And it costs billions over the course of time. The hard part is that the person who is afflicted doesn’t even know , their minds have become captive to something else; and their families are stigmatized, embarrassed, judged and set aside. No one like to deal with a problem that doesn’t seem fixable and appears self inflicted. (IT IS NOT)

Sounds of Silence…..those words haunt me, because they do not describe silence. They describe darkness being a friend to talk to , visions creeping in while sleeping and seeds being planted in his mind. But it is familiar and he considers it a friend, someone he is acquainted with. Think of a child with an invisable friend, or a monster under the bed….what if they had insight into the spiritual and we did not protect them with the word of God and told those foul spirits to leave in Jesus name. What if they were trying to tell us something and we didn’t listen because we didn’t believe. We need to Close all portals of unforgiveness , bitterness and rejection and shame, (any many others), which often lead to destructive behaviors people use to cover it all up,hide it, run from it

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking,
People hearing without listening,
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence.

I don’t have the answers, this is simply a writing of thoughts along the way of my journey into this dark world I have been thrown into and my wondering about what is going on. I want to fight this on all sides, I want to help those in every area. A war cannot be won on one front, it must be flanked and surrounded until the enemy surrenders. In this case I will fight, pray, study both the word of God and the word of doctors. I will search medicines, nutrition and deliverance as well I believe we saw a miracle for 9 months, I know it and I will not let my faith be shaken…..This son of my will be of sound mind and not possessing a spirit of fear. Here me enemy of the light, your days are numbered, in the name of Jesus Christ you will leave and your plans thwarted not only for my son but for a multitude. Amen, which means SO BE IT