Sheila Walsh: If depression has been viewed as a taboo subject in the...

If you feel stuck, bring your whole self to Christ, not just the problem, but you. Ask God to change your heart. Commit yourself to pray to that end. It's God's heart to give good gifts to His children.

Sheila Walsh

encouraging change god

My brokenness is a better bridge for people than my pretend wholeness ever was.

Sheila Walsh

deep-thought bridges people

God has promised that whatever you face, you are not alone. He knows your pain. He loves you. And He will bring you through the fire.

Sheila Walsh

pain christian god

My times of silence before God are very important to me now. I put everything else down, every word away, and I am with the Lord. When I'm quiet, life falls into perspective for me. I have a very active mind and I'm a worrier, but in those moments when I choose to put that away, I rest beside the Shepherd in still places. Why don't you give yourself a gift today? Turn off the television or the car stereo, put down the newspaper or the business plan, and in the quietness, rest for a while beside the Shepherd of your soul.

Sheila Walsh

perspective giving fall

Suffering is seldom an item on our list of requests to the Lord. But when it crosses our path and we are able by his grace to keep on walking, our lives become messages of hope to the world and to the church.

Sheila Walsh

encouragement grace hope

In these uncertain times, I know 100 percent that I can stake my life on the unshakeable, unchanging promises of God!

Sheila Walsh

uncertain-times stakes promise

When depression or suicidal thoughts weigh heavily, the hardest thing to do is to fight. My battle weapons are the Word of God, meditation, confession, community, and worship. But each evening I take my medication with a prayer of thanksgiving that God has provided this kind of help for those of us who need it.

Sheila Walsh

suicidal fighting prayer

Can't you tell when you're with someone who's listening? She hears you, really hears you. He hears the sadness in your tone or catches your joy. Be a listener, to music, to life, to others, to God. Life is noisy, but there is music in every heartbeat. God is waiting to bring joy and peace to the confusion of our days.

Sheila Walsh

sadness confusion joy

God's love is a gift that can make you forget yourself at times. The Scottish writer George MacDonald said, "It is the heart that is not yet sure of its God that is afraid to laugh in his presence." God loves us as we are right now! That's one of the things I'm most grateful for. I love the freedom to be myself in God. I pray that a year from now, five years from now, I will be a godlier woman, but I know God won't love me any more than he does right this minute.

Sheila Walsh

grateful god heart

If guilt tells us that we've done something wrong, then shame tells us that we are something wrong. So many people feel isolated, not good enough, defined by the labels they wear rather than the identity they have in Christ. The love of Christ tells us that we're accepted; that we belong.

Sheila Walsh

not-good-enough guilt people

If we mistake God's silence for indifference, we are the most miserable of people. If we give up when we no longer understand, we reject His caring, steadfast love and cut ourselves off from our only real hope.

Sheila Walsh

giving-up encouragement hope

Some people will not understand what the love of Christ compels you to do; do it anyway.

Sheila Walsh

people christ

When we don't deal honestly with our lives and the losses we face, when we try to anesthetize the pain and move on, then the suppressed anger or fear or guilt will deal with us until we are ready to deal with those issues.

Sheila Walsh

pain loss moving

When our dreams seem to go sour or remain unfulfilled, hopelessness can dominate our lives-or we can hold on with open hands, knowing that we have hope because God is faithful.

Sheila Walsh

encouragement hope dream

We live in a culture of quick fixes. We want to feel better and we want to feel better now. I believe that's why many turn to alcohol and drugs because they want to numb the pain of life. In my life I have a choice. I can sit with my depression and look at Jesus or I can sit with Jesus and look at my depression. What I mean by that is I can focus on what's broken and wonder where God is or I can sit in the companionship of Christ who suffered for us and worship him in the middle of the mess. That gives my pain meaning and context.

Sheila Walsh

pain believe jesus

It takes deliberate and continuous effort to carve out time in our overfull schedules to listen to the voice of God.

Sheila Walsh

schedules effort voice

I was driving down a familiar road one fall day when I almost drove off the road, the beauty was so intense. It looked as if God had sent in a team of the world's finest artists overnight-and I was privy to the opening day of his spectacle. As I slowly drove along this festive row, leaves danced in the air and brushed against my windshield. It seemed as if I had landed in Oz. I was strongly tempted to get out and clap at God's imagination.

Sheila Walsh

team beauty fall

The world is not looking for Stepford-type Christians. People are tired of pretense. We struggle with failures; we long for intimacy. So why are we feigning perfection before God and one another.

Sheila Walsh

tired struggle christian

The Father is truly the only Promise Maker who is in earnest a Promise Keeper. A promise from God is a promise kept.

Sheila Walsh

makers father promise

It's my absolute passionate belief that every single human being, man, woman, or child, is aching to find a face-to-face relationship with God.

Sheila Walsh

faces men children

If depression has been viewed as a taboo subject in the church, then suicide and suicidal thoughts are the darkest secret of all. Talking about it doesn't make it more real or powerful; it brings it out of the shadows into the light and love of Christ.