By Mike Jacquart
Waiting on the Lord is always a good idea. This can be particularly true during challenging periods in our lives. This was particularly true for me roughly twenty years ago.
In large part due to my undiagnosed mental health conditions, the working world had long been challenging for me. This was an obstacle that reached its ugly apex after I lost two jobs in less than two years. (I explained how depression can wreak havoc in the workplace in my Voices of Hope presentation earlier this month.)
Unsure what to do next, I leaned on the Lord like never before. Jeremiah 29:11 states, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope” (NKJV). I memorized this scripture and recited it to myself each day. “At home, at the grocery store, in the car, wherever I was, the more I thought about the verse, the more I believed it and the better I felt,” as I wrote in my book, Climbing out of Darkness: A Personal Journey into Mental Wellness.
The book of Proverbs (3:5-6) provided another hopeful scripture that I committed to memory. The part about “lean not on your own understanding” particularly caught my eye because, in terms of jobs, clearly leaning on “my understanding” was not working very well.
I should note this was a period of unemployment unlike any other in my life. Not only out of work for months, at age 43 I was now utterly directionless, like a ship without a rudder. The Lord had slowly been revealing to me that there was something going on beyond just the job itself that was causing many of my problems. As part of this soul-seeing, sometimes gut-wrenching process, I finally sought counseling, which led to a diagnosis of “depression and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.”
After being prescribed a useful prescription, I began feeling better. And BETTER. So much so that, even though I was still out of work, I was overcome with joy about the simplest things. My wife. The great weather. (It was early summer). Music had always enjoyed, but never like this! What an aha moment!
Finally, after eight months of unemployment, I accepted a position as editor at a Christian newsletter publishing company. It was a job I held for fourteen years, much longer than I held any previous job. I loved my work and the people there. What a giant blessing.
The moral of the story: If you are reading this and struggling, do not ever give up! God has not forgotten you. There IS a plan – you just don’t know what it is yet!
Mike Jacquart is an author and retired editor who enjoys sharing his story of “pushing through” on blog posts, podcasts, and other presentations. For more information, contact him at madjac@tds.net.
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