On occassion, I’m reminded that life is cyclical. It moves, it comes back to you. I’m not sure that I believe in karma, but I do believe in being able to meet people where they are because you once were there yourself.
Today I was contacted by an old friend that I haven’t seen or spoken to since college. She kindly asked me how I was doing, but her tone was different - not as ‘robust’ of a spirit as I had remembered. She said she had been reading some of her old college journals and noticed where she used to pray for me. You see, when I was in college I battled with depression and anxiety. My battle was not extreme but difficult nonetheless. My friend had been perceptive enough to see this during college and became one of my unseen angels, praying for me in the shadows. I can not thank her enough for those prayers. However, in our conversation, she opened up to me that she was currently suffering from the same dark nights that I once experienced.
That God has put me in a place to minister just as much to others as they have to me is astounding. I do not want to take this gift lightly. I am humbled that my Father allows such a gracious opportunity to share in the pain of someone else. To know the fear she feels, and to be able to comfort her and empathize, to give her hope for a peaceful future, to ease her worries a bit is such a great gift in my life.
I can so often get lost in the “why me’s?” of life. Obviously, God is bigger and more mysterious than I can know. If my only reason to have experienced the darkness of depression was to meet this friend in her own pain and ease her even a slight bit, is reason enough.
