Reprinted from The Christian Science Monitor Saved from suicide By D. K. Simms
Any thought of suicide, whether you are a teenager, a businessperson, or a retiree, is not an answer. It may appear to offer help in your despair. But it is a lie and offers no solution.
While attending a small college years ago, I felt that there was no place in the world for me. As I sat in my room trying to decide how I would take my life, I said out loud, “There has to be a way out of this.” And instead of taking my life that evening, I went to a church service on campus, offered by a local minister.
He spoke about God being at the rudder of the ship of life, steering us through the storms of unhappiness, abuse, meanness, sadness, and whatever else felt threatening. He called prayer a life raft. He promised that God hears and answers every prayer.
Suicide would fool us into believing that it can help us, but prayer, he shouted, is the only way to this ship of life. He asked each of us to close our eyes and pray to be on that ship of life and to be thankful to be free from the storms. I walked away from that meeting, completely free from thinking that any answers could be found in taking my life.
Remembering this incident as I read reports of recent suicides, I wondered how I could share the conviction I gained about suicide—that it provides no solutions.
In Science and Health, the chapter called “Prayer” asks: “Dost thou ‘love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind’? This command includes much, even the surrender of all merely material sensation, affection, and worship” (p. 9). Starting prayer with love is primary. God is Love. We love God. Just quietly knowing that God loves and knows you, and that you know and love God, can clear the trouble from your thoughts. And you can feel this love extinguishing fear and grief.
The heart is usually associated with love, and each heartbeat can be a symbol of the continuous love God expresses to us and the love we desire to express in our lives. I sometimes think of each beat as a fresh view of love that is being offered to me. This has awakened me to realize my worth.
As we seek to be aware of God’s allness in our actions and activities, this prayer assures us that we can’t be held in the grip of slavery or abuse. The Scriptures say that all God sees is good, and nothing good is withheld from anyone (see Ps. 84:11). I see more good in my life as I focus on the all of God.
Prayer opens the door that no one can close, to seeing the natural beauty and holiness in ourselves, because we are the expression of Soul, God. As we see our own worth, beauty, and holiness, our thoughts are free. This change in thought will allow ideas to come that will bless us and others.
As we recognize the power of God as Love, even for a moment, lack of worth, lack of affection, the cycles of abuse, and oppression that have ruled our lives will begin to dissolve.
The Scriptures offer proof that we are entitled to goodness, happiness, and productive lives. Here are a few statements that illustrate this:
“You are always with me, and all that is mine is yours” (Luke 15:31); “Strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well”
(Matt. 6:33);
“Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. Incline your ear, and come to me; listen, so that you may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant” (Isa. 55:2, 3; all Bible quotes from the New Revised Standard Version).
This is where our prayer takes us. Just as I was led to attend that meeting on campus so many years ago instead of taking my life, may you be led to behold the power of prayer to steer you. God does love you, and you can live.
You have delivered my soul from death,
my eyes from tears,
my feet from stumbling.
I walk before the Lord
in the land of the living.
Psalms 116:8–9
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