Before I Died

I died on December 15, 2006. On that day I was diagnosed with Type I diabetes. Although it appeared that my life was sentenced by that diagnosis, my death was not caused by diabetes. That was an excuse; something I could tell the world so people in it might believe they understood why I was acting as I was. The truth is that diabetes had been one result of the battle between the Lord and Satan in my life. I had lost the ability to hear the Lord’s voice and decided to give myself to the enemy. It has taken almost 15 years for me to find my way back to God totally and completely (almost half my “so-called” life). The Lord knew the plans He had for me, however, and He knew I had to die so that I might live again.

During those 15 years of being dead, I learned to hear God’s voice. I dragged my feet when confronted by His commands, kicking and screaming through most of them, but He never left me. He detached me from everything, even the good things in my world that I didn’t think required detachment–my friends, my parents, my family, my home, even my self-discipline. He replaced those with pure freedom, greater than I ever thought possible.

For the past few weeks, I have found myself in a state of deja vu. I have felt the enemy’s attack but I have also felt strength to fight it from the Lord. In many ways, I am living the way I did before I died in 2006. Before December 15 of that year, I was bombarded with words of motivation from God but never recognized His voice. Instead I gave into the fear and torment presented by Satan. I always drew inspiration from movies, music, the theater, etc. but allowed the divine presence into these experiences and asked for the Lord to take control. These inspirations from worldly sources always fell short in the end, essentially breaking my heart. I watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy over and over again and this series of movies gave me hope, but when it ended, I cried for days because it could not go on forever. I had many other moments like that. Each time my heart broke, I drew closer to my death. At the moment of my diagnosis I died, not because of the illness, but because I finally gave up. Life was truly not worth living.

In a way, this is true–life here on earth is worthless and there is not much point to living here unless you have the crucial presence of God with you to give your existence meaning. These past weeks, He has allowed me to relive all the moments I lost to the enemy over 15 years ago. I actually relived a concert with one of my favorite bands in high school, and during that concert I felt alive for the first time in 15 years. The reason for this was that my savior Jesus Christ was by my side. The first time I attended a concert given by this band, I fell under the spell of the band and looked to its music to save me. Of course, this ended badly because the band was merely an icon and could never take the place of God. Another cause of past heartbreak, but during this recent concert, my heart was mended. I saw the Lord’s presence in the concert, and when it ended this time, the joy did not. The joy was preserved safely by Jesus, and He will make sure the joy never fades.

I feel as though I have been placed on a journey of rediscovering the person I was before I died. This journey of rediscovery seems to be reaching its conclusion. The world is changing around me, and not for the better, but I am also changing, I believe for the better. God is preparing me for something I cannot imagine. The darkest hour is just before the dawn, as the old saying goes. But unlike my darkest hour before December 15, 2006, I am not clouded with fear and I have complete faith that God will keep me safe and save the world as well. The apostle Peter had so much faith in Jesus that he walked on water, and maybe I can have the same faith that God will do what medical science has been unable to do and take away my diabetes.

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Originally published at Kitty in the City

Photo: Public Domain