Whats going on with Richie 4?

I last left you with the understanding that I suffer from Clinical Depression and anxiety disorder. Apparently that is argumentative to some that this could happen to someone via a bio-chemical reaction to some medication. To you I say whatever! So as Paul Harvey would say “here is the rest of the story!” Being completely irrational and cognitively impaired my wife forced me into our car. We dropped our children off at a wonderful friend of ours home. Then proceed to the hospital were I was admitted into their Psychiatric unit for fourteen days. I have mixed emotions about sharing this because in our culture and in my family these types of problems were just dealt with and not expressed. “Buck up” or the ole pull yourself up by your boot straps was the attitude I generally received. You certainly didn’t go into a psych ward for treatment and help! Which is to me know seems odd considering hours before I had a gun to my head ready to end my life! How do you “buck it up” from that? The other reaction I got was that I needed to pray more! Really, no kidding I am a Pastor I have a clear understanding of the vital need for pray in my life. Another reaction I received was I had sin in my life….. Now for most you this is a no brainer! The bible says “all have sinned” we are all sinners. I know I have sin in my life. I also know that Jesus Christ died on a cross for my sin and that sin is forgiven. But let us not stray into a theological discussion on this point and stick with my story. As the doctors began treating the chemical imbalance in my brain some of the darkness and despair started to lift. The hurt and loneliness and mistrust of people was still there but the hopelessness and despair were waning. This is when I really began to look for what God was doing! The Why? God why are you putting me through this nightmare? God didn’t answer…… not right away. I battled in struggling to find God in all this mess of my life. I will freely admit this was a dark time in my life. I questioned everything. I pleaded with God. I yelled at God. I ignored Him. I cried to him. Then as I was reading my bible God put me in Matt 11:28…… “Come unto me all who struggle all that have falling under the weight of life, Come to me you who are carrying such heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” I cried like a 14 year old girl! (Sorry 14yo girls you will understand one day). God I cannot make it on my own. I cannot go another step with me carrying these burdens. I gave it over to God. I spent my fourteen days there and gained strength. I started to get my feet under me so I could function and they released me. I was free out in the world again. I would love to say it was all peaches and strawberries from then on but it wasn’t! I had many friends who told me they would support me and be there for me. That they would check up on me and encourage me. Some, God bless them, have done just that and been so faithful and true. Other just walked away completely! Some realizing that I was still a mess couldn’t bare the swings in mood and the ups and downs that go with depression. Soon those just faded away! They have their own lives to deal with and their own business to worry about. It was fine! I found some really true friends who rose up and helped me battle what I am going through. You see I know I am not fine. I know I still struggle with loneliness, rejection and abandonment. I battle my mind everyday telling myself that I have friends and people who really care about me. It is a struggle which at times I win and other times I do not. That is what is hard for people to understand! The one day I was driving back from therapy and God in his infinite wisdom and love put a song into my head. What a friend we have in Jesus, All our sins and griefs to bear! What a privilege to carry Everything to God in prayer! O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, All because we do not carry Everything to God in prayer. Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere? We should never be discouraged; Take it to the Lord in prayer. Can we find a friend so faithful Who will all our sorrows share? Jesus knows our every weakness; Take it to the Lord in prayer. I wasn’t alone! I wasn’t hopeless! Those friends who are to busy or scared to talk with me arent my worry, much, anymore. I have a friend who loves me and will carry my burdens. I am by no means better. Many nights I suffer in agony and loneliness. Where despair grips my heart. When there is no one to reach out to pull me up. I sing this song! I trust my savior to carry me and guide me. I have more to my story of what is going on but some of it is not information I am able to share. What I wish most is that if you are struggling I want you to know YOU ARE NOT ALONE!!! You are not different we all experience tough times and up and downs. When the downs stay and overwhelm you, its time to talk to someone not “buck it up”! Its not easy! I still hurt I still cry myself to sleep with depression. I still get overwhelmed with anxiety but I have help. I have a Savior!

I wanna be rich!!!

I Wanna be Rich?
Sound familiar? It should, it is the underlying ideology in our culture. Now I am not saying that all of us want to be Bill Gates or Donald Trump or that we want to have private planes to fly off to Hawaii whenever we desire. What I am saying is that everything that drives our economy and American way of life is the need, or you can say greed, for the dollar. We are conditioned to make more then our parents. We are marketed to in a way that drives us to get better cars, bigger televisions and smarter phones then our neighbor. The American dream has changed from simply being free to live and direct my life as I choose to having it all!  Now there is nothing wrong with that, however, it has changed the perspective on what it means to be rich. Let's look at the perspective of just how rich we are in the US.

 If you are making the median income in the US, $32,000, you are part of the 1 percent richest in the world! How is that for a perspective? Scary to think that I am included in the richest in the world. Consider the fact that just being born in the US ranks you in the 20% richest in the world. You live in a country that contains 80% of the wealth in the world. The problem isn’t with the riches of the United States, it is with our perspective of money and riches.

Look at a Bible passages with me, 1 Timothy 6:6-14;

6:6 Now godliness combined with contentment brings great profit. 6:7 For we have brought nothing into this world and so we cannot take a single thing out either. 6:8 But if we have food and shelter, we will be satisfied with that. 6:9 Those who long to be rich, however, stumble into temptation and a trap and many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 6:10 For the love of money is the root of all evils. Some people in reaching for it have strayed from the faith and stabbed themselves with many pains.

6:11 But you, as a person dedicated to God, keep away from all that. Instead pursue righteousness, godliness, faithfulness, love, endurance, and gentleness. 6:12 Compete well for the faith and lay hold of that eternal life you were called for and made your good confession for in the presence of many witnesses. 6:13 I charge you before God who gives life to all things and Christ Jesus who made his good confession before Pontius Pilate, 6:14 to obey this command without fault or failure until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.

There is a lot in this bible passage that speaks to us about our lives and dealing with money! My intention though is just to point out a couple of things. Look with me at verse 6. Paul is writing this to Timothy who is following in Paul's footsteps as a preacher and pastor. Notice what he tells him brings profit, Godliness and contentment. Does that sound like the current American philosophy? Not even close! Yes the desire to gain wealth has always been around and it will never go away. But what is missing in society is contentment. The overwhelming desire for more is increasing in society. Why are we not content with what we have? Paul answered this for us in the beginning of the verse, Godliness. We are further away from God as a culture then ever before. We could look to the old testament and see many examples of the children of Israel drift away from God. Each time they would drift we can see them becoming more discontent in their lives and country. This drift is caused by a heart condition.

That brings me to the second point in this bible passage and probably the most recognizable verse in this passage. Verse 10, speaks not some much about money as it does about the condition of our heart. If money is what we love, then our hearts and minds will be consumed with its courtship. That is what bible hear is warning us about! Remember what Jesus said, "Where you treasure is, there will be your heart also." In the United States our heart is in money. Every political decision is wrapped about in money. The bottom line has become more important the people. This is true in government and in the private sector. You see our hearts, eyes, minds have the wrong perspective.

We find our perspective laid out for us in verse 11. We are to pursue righteousness, godliness, faithfulness, love, endurance, and gentleness. Think about that for a second. If each one of us this month just worked on doing these things what our country would look like! All theological and spiritual implication aside, if we just pursued these things what a transformation we would go through in every sector.

  

So has does this apply to America today? We really have no idea how wealthy we are in the US. Our perspective of what is poor is so skewed we are confused as to what is poor.  I don’t intend to say we should not be helping those in our country who are needy. My point is we have to have an understanding of how much we do have so that we may reach out to those who do not!  We must continue to help others in our own country and around the world. Doing this with a proper perspective may require taking inventory of the blessings we already have and not focus on what we don’t have. Because when we see how truly blessed we are and what we have, our perspective will be much different.

In the next coming weeks I will be in an area of Ecuador that is financially poor. The people on the other hand are unbelievably loving and caring. They are rich in many ways that many of us couldn’t understand. I will be sharing with you my experiences and thoughts while I am away!