(This is a long post but a lot happened over the weekend.)

Don’t know what your weekend was like but mine was pretty eventful.

Hubby got home Saturday morning at 1:00 AM from a trip.

We had hoped we would sleep in Saturday morning.

We didn’t.

Saturday I had my elementary school reunion. Yes, elementary school. It was a small school where everyone knew everyone so it’s for all the years from when the school began till when it was closed down, which wasn’t that long.

It is now a Teen Challenge residence and rehabilitation center. I believe it is the original one and there are now hundreds throughout the US.

Just so you now, Teen Challenge is a Christian based, treatment center for young people and adults who have fallen victim to drugs and/or alcohol abuse. The Teen Challenge program itself has the lowest recidivism rate of all drug and alcohol centers across the US, averaging around twenty percent.

So at the class reunion I was reacquainted with the first boyfriend I ever had and the first kiss I ever had. My hubby was great about it. I didn’t know if “Bobby” would remember or not. He did. First words out of his mouth were, “Well, if it isn’t my first girlfriend!”

By the way, it was fifth grade romance. Not much of a romance, huh? You must be thinking, “She kissed a boy in the fifth grade?” Yes, Yes, I did.

Moving on…

So finally Saturday night we slept in and missed church Sunday morning. Which as it turned out was kind of good.

We were both brushing our teeth, etc, when a bad storm hit. It was over in just a few minutes. I thought I heard something fall on the deck so I came downstairs to check. The deck was a mess with branches everywhere.

Well, where did the branches come from, I wondered. I went around the garage and saw a tree from my neighbors yard which had fallen on our yard. It ruined her fence but didn’t hit anything on our property. It just made a big mess.

It was wet to begin the clean up so I came back in. I finished getting dressed and went to the sun room as were going to watch an episode of Andy Stanley, seeing as we’d missed church.

Did you ever have a moment when you couldn’t believe what you were seeing? This was one of those moments.

I looked out the window, took a moment to process what I saw and then quickly ran to get my husband.

“You better see this”, I exclaimed.

Our last remaining Locust tree (it was huge), was completely uprooted and as it fell it had taken out a few more trees. Thank goodness, it didn’t hit the house.

So what does any of this have to do with depression?

Nothing and everything.

I could get really “down” about this but I’m not. When I see on the news about what so many others have gone through with floods, earthquakes, mudslides, tornadoes. …Not to mention the people who have lost loved ones due to gun violence….

The point I am making is this:

Life happens. And when it does, if our faith hasn’t grown by this time, it won’t now for sure now because we will be in crisis mode. That doesn’t mean, of course, that God won’t still be there for us.

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He will.

And maybe we will be stronger afterwards but maybe not. It’s never good to handle anything in crisis mode if it can be handled ahead of time. It’s good to have a strong spiritual history when life hands us a curve ball.

Throughout the Old Testament, there is story after story about how the Israelites cried out to God time and again when faced with a crisis. God always came to their rescue but shortly thereafter they would turn away again.

They were just using God to get what they wanted and God kept giving them second chances. But they didn’t learn a thing. They didn’t grow in their faith.

That’s not the way to live out our faith.

My hubby and I didn’t like what happened but it didn’t throw us at all. The first thing we did was thanked God that our house and both of us were kept safe. We prayed and asked for wisdom for who to call for the tree removal and that it would all go smoothly.

About three hours later, the doorbell rang. My neighbor in the back whose tree had fallen in our yard, had called her children and they had come over immediately to cut up the tree and remove the mess from our yard. So one tree is taken care of.

When depression strikes, it’s so much better to have a strong faith history with God. To have had many occasions were we’ve grown and learned more about Him. The more we become intimately acquainted with God and His ways, the more we are equipped to handle depression when it rears its ugly head and the better able we are to stave off an attack.

As I said, what a weekend. And how glad I am to say that God have us much peace about this.

I hope your day is great and God bless you and protect you.

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