As the claps get closer, I feel the panic rising, my heart races, and my body revolts. With each new clap, I’m dragged backward in time. I try to stop the fall. I kick and scream, flailing my arms out, but I’m not able to hold on to the here and now. I don’t want to go back there.

This transformation in me probably makes no sense to some, is hard to fathom, and goes against our very human nature. I truly do understand that and the difficulty of reading what I am writing about.

I come to you now not “cured," But I come to you stronger, healthier, happier, and both renewed and in the process of renewal.

A moment can not stretch; it has no way to expand beyond its purpose, it is only this precise moment you are in.

I don’t care if I hurt, main, take, or disappoint. It is my nature; it is what I am.

I want to propose a different way of looking at “be still” for anyone struggling and waiting on God.

Accepting Jesus does not automatically equate you to being the “perfect” evangelist or take away nerves or fear.

I looked into this because I saw a post with a simple question about something in the Bible. I got the impression they were a new Christian, and the question was simple. They were asking about Noah and something to the effect of if we thought he took eggs onto the ark in some cases to save space.

Concern is natural; it’s a safety system set up by God. We can take that concern to God and seek help before anxiety takes over.

I have dealt with intrusive thoughts since I was a child, it straight-up sucks. What's even more exhausting is the judgment I’ve gotten from people over the years, and to be completely honest — it’s one thing to get ignorant comments from a nonbeliever, but it’s a completely different story getting ignorant comments of any kind from a Christian when you too are a Christian.