Joanna Rivera
If you asked me 3 years ago what God meant to me, I would tell you he wasn't anyone I was interested in knowing.
I wasn't interested in a God who watched me suffer my entire life and did nothing about it. The resentment I harbored for him had been brewing up inside me since the minute I began to recognize his name.
I spent most of my life wanting to die, carrying an unknown pain, so heavy, so deep… it felt like I was suffocating every day of my life. My life wasn’t real; it was like being stuck in a twisted nightmare. I was trying to survive a life I wasn't living.
My life was built on pain, trying to find my identity in every person I met, living in endless mental agony, just trying to keep myself alive. I could count the number of attempts against my own life on both hands; living became too hard. I started self-harming in the 7th grade, but the thoughts had been present since I was 6.
I was screaming for help, and no one knew how to deal with me. I was labeled “too hard to love,” and the label stuck. I couldn’t understand why I was so broken, and somewhere inside me, anger and hate began to settle in.
I became a horrible person, taking on a narcissistic and twisted persona; my heart was hard and full of evil. My mind was a battlefield of sick thoughts; I wasn’t real; dissociation became my everyday normal. I was no longer able to focus or hold conversations, or retain information.
I couldn't learn new things; my mind was trying to survive. It was the only way I could keep myself alive. I had to disassociate to live. During this time, I hurt so many people, such as my own family, but my family was where the hurting came from the most.
Growing up in a home where love didn't exist, where abuse was masked as discipline, the truth was hidden. I was the black sheep because, unlike my brothers and mother, I couldn’t hide my pain. It was real for me, and I wasn’t keeping quiet like she wanted me to. Everything that I was and did came from a place I didn’t understand.
Was it real? The memories of my abuse? I was resentful; I had a vendetta against anyone who hurt me or turned their backs on me, hurting my family, myself, and everyone around me. At some point, I went manic; I lost all my sanity, I spent more time in psych wards than at home, developing an eating disorder, and struggling with demons I wasn’t aware of.
I hated who I was, and I kept asking myself Why me? I yelled at God, cursed at him, and blamed him. I spent the next few years making bad decisions, bad relationships, playing the victim in every situation, but the reality of it was that I was the problem.
All I ever knew was pain, and I always looked for comfort in those who caused me pain; it was almost as if I wanted to be broken down more and more. I was comfortable in my pain, in my depression, anxiety, and false identity.
I became chained to my bed, I stopped taking care of myself, I was imprisoned in my own mind, and I was a slave to myself. I was afraid, afraid of being alone and of being abandoned the way I was as a child. Anxious attachment became my best friend—I thought I would die if someone left me.
I made awful decisions that left deep marks and wounds on my soul, things that broke me even more. My resentment for God had settled, and any mention of his name brought on a deep anger. I indulged in alcohol and smoking, drowning myself in temporary fillers, things that only made me feel worse.
The enemy had me right where he wanted me; I went from knowing God to being a complete atheist. I was into new age witchcraft, tarot, crystals, etc. I was dabbling with a witch from Nigeria, assisting her in things I thought were harmless.
I would walk around speaking lies of the enemy, telling people that God was not real. He was someone we made up for comfort, for stability. I was only fooling myself because I was still so empty, still in so much pain, fighting silent battles that eventually won me over.
The last attempt I ever had on my life was the first encounter I had with the Holy Spirit. I was heavy into social media, and I remember scrolling, and every video I came across said: “God loves you.” “Lay all your burdens on him.” It continued until I felt that tug in my heart and tears started flowing, violent, painful sobs came out of me, and for the first time in my life, I cried out to God.
I needed help. I needed him.
Here I was, clinging to life, so desperately wanting to get out of the agony I spent every day in. I don’t serve God to simply do it; I serve a GOD who took me out of the hell I was living in, who broke chains and generational curses, who set me FREE.
He showed me the truth, revealed to me the pain to its roots, and comforted me when the lies that my life was built on finally surfaced. The years of sexual, mental, and physical abuse, and of loss and heartache, did not ruin my life.
Glory to God for the pain, because it brought me to him. His love and protection followed me every day. My attempts never succeeded because he was protecting me; he protected the little girl who took beatings to the face, beatings that could've killed her at the ripe age of 4.
When God calls you from the womb, the enemy will stop at nothing to break you, to prevent you from walking in your purpose, but God prevails, because what he says will come to be, and it's never too late to find your way back home.
