Hallelujah!! God is so incredible. You're probably wondering where I'm coming from on this (although it shouldn't be so rare a cause for your wonder), so here is sort of where I've been for the past 4 months. I've been meaning to record it all as it goes, but time has not permit...
Back in April, after attending my church spring break trip (Bible and Beach) down in Panama City, one of my small group leaders and I got extremely close. She was a huge part of why I grew so close to Him and found out where I was meant in His plan. We decided to meet a few times a month to go through a devotional book. We went through with this plan, her pouring His insight into my life, and me continuing to grow.
That is, until September.
The last week of September, my leader threw upon me the fact that God was telling her it wasn't exactly right meeting with me. Apparently it wasn't fair to the other girls that I spent so much time with her. Also, we had begun to drift our focus away from the Word and onto her relationship with her boyfriend. It was hard to hear this from her, but I cried and went on. So I thought.
Life from there just kept going downhill.. spiritually, that is. I kept pleading with God, asking Him to reappear in my life. I felt like He wasn't walking alongside me like I'd always heard Him promise. I wanted to be passionate for Him. I mean, I'd always been a leader in the church, in my school, it just wasn't working for me. I would despise everything except for being with my friends, making money, and being lazy. Basketball? PSHhh. I would want to be ill so I wouldn't have to go. School? I hated it. I only have one or two good friends there, so there wasn't any joy in that area. Family? Completely driving me crazy.
I think I was going through a period of light depression. That is definitely hard to admit, but I will. I cried all the time, during practices, free time at home, and even math class. I didn't know how to get Him to become active again. I felt deceived.
After about 2 1/2 months of going through this stage, I felt as though He'd left me be to see how I could do without Him. To tell you the truth, I was totally fine with that! I thought to myself, "Danielle, if He won't become evident when you ask, go at it alone. It has to be better than what you're going through now". So there I went, independence galore!
It was fine at first, being on my own. I only read my Bible as a responsibility for basketball, thinking my coach might start asking questions on what we were to read. I didn't want to sit in a church service feeling like a hypocrite. The only reason I continued to act like a Christ-follower is because in the back of my head, I knew I would come back to my senses. I didn't want to do that with a plethera of mistakes following right behind me.
This stage was horrible. Even worse than the one before. I was so alone. I've never been one to pray very hard. I didn't want it. I didn't have time to talk about it with friends. I felt completely hopeless.
I began sharing this with a few people, mainly my youth pastor, Chad. He kept asking how I was doing and He would offer advice, though he admitted he didn't know what was going on.
Later in one of the high school services, they told us if we needed to talk to a leader, they would pray with us. I briskly walked over to Chad, and he began to pour out his heart in prayer for me. I just stood there, arms around him, crying. It's what I needed. Totally.
Then I began the road of reconstruction. I think I'm almost through, and boy am I happy He was so incredibly awesome in my life even when I fell away.
