Anna's Story

We arrived home to get a phone call from a very dear friend. She called to let me be the first one to know that her 15-year-old son had just committed suicide.

 

 

All I know is in that very moment, I felt like all the air in my lungs had suddenly been taken from me and a crushing weight had been placed upon my chest that was too heavy to lift. Great sobs entrenched my body and she and I just wept.

 

I immediately felt God’s overwhelming presence to pray and beg for words that I could not put together. I have walked through the aftermath of the suicide of my father years ago and could see a much younger me (in my mind) standing beside this friend as she found her son just after the gun sounded. 

 

Sorrow will intensify and wane in the days and years to come, but through experience, I know it can be immediately brought back to the same intensity as the moment the tragedy hits. If there is ever a time to reach out to brothers and sisters in Christ to uphold them, it is always now.

 

 

Sorrow is numbing. Sorrow can make you angry. Sorrow is isolating. Sorrow is hard. Sorrow is weighty.  Sorrow is crushing. Sorrow brings headaches and body aches. Sorrow tests your will for life. 

 

But God… 

 

There is joy from it all, in the presence of God.