SEPARATION ANXIETY

10/13/14

Separation anxiety disorder (SAD) is a psychological condition in which an individual experiences excessive anxiety regarding separation from home or from people to whom the individual has a strong emotional attachment (e.g. a parent, grandparents, or siblings).

In April, 1989 my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer that had spread to her lungs and lymph nodes.  I was 3,000 miles away and was trying to do my part as the oldest daughter I felt compelled to do as much as I could.  Within a year, I traveled to Ohio 3 times, every 3 months and the final trip was April, 1990 my mother’s funeral.   When my mother was critically ill I found I needed to talk to someone.  It was a hard to do but I began see a psychologist and he asked me “what was going on in my life”? I quickly told him about my mother.  And for the visits that followed, every time he mentioned my mother I began crying, she was alive, and I was grieving before we even knew what GOD’s plan was for her life.  I remember the counselor saying I was having separation anxiety.  My mother and I wasn’t as close as she was with my younger sister, I wasn’t her favorite and I had been on my own since I was 16 and yet I felt like something was being torn away from me.  

Anytime we’re separated from someone by choice or by circumstance, it’s agonizing.  The pain is relentless.  Think back at a time that you were separated from someone you loved.  My memory is as if it was yesterday.  The pain was so deep that I couldn’t breathe.  It’s as though my life had been sucked right out of me.  Does this bring back memories for you?  Do you remember how you felt?

Sometimes we step outside the parameters of our relationship with GOD.  We push the envelope.  We know in our heart where we’re to be, what we’re to do, what we’re to say, how we’re to act, the character that HE expects of us, the vocation that HE wants for us, yet we cause that separation between us and GOD.  And anyone who truly knows the depth of GOD’s love and the sacrifice that HE gave for us, has said yes to HIM and has developed a relationship with HIM knows that any separation from GOD or perceived distancing  causes separation anxiety at its highest point.

Even when we’ve stayed inside the boundaries and are on point, on track and are following the steps that have been ordered, the slightest separation or perceived distancing from GOD is unbearable.  About 13 years ago an incident happened at work that caused me to leave the premises in a fragile state.  I was broken and all I knew is I needed to hear from GOD.  I needed to feel HIS presence.  I went to the park where I had gone so many times to commune with HIM, and to be in total fellowship with HIM as I had done so many times before.  It was one of the places where I found peace and comfort in the arms of my FATHER and it kept me going.  I’d sat on top of the park bench for hours waiting to hear from GOD, waiting for that shroud of peace and comfort that I desperately needed but it didn’t come.  I was crying and waiting and waiting and crying and I felt I was the only one left on the planet and no one but GOD understood me and the situation at hand.  Some would say I was being persecuted on the job, I wouldn’t say persecuted, but I will say the pressure of what was going on at the job was unbearable.  And here I was waiting for GOD to speak to me, to rescue me, to pull me up out of the pit that I was sinking into, but HE never answered. 

Day after day after day I’d go to a hill, park my car, look out over the city, pray, cry and wait for GOD, and I was steadily asking HIM where are YOU?  Speak to me.  I felt hopeless, lifeless and was growing faint in my faith.  Running on in this race wasn’t in my vocabulary nor my heart, I was hurting not because of the trial I was going through but because I had separation anxiety.  I was being temporary separated from GOD and all I knew was this had to be temporal because if it lasted for more than a season, I wouldn’t make it.  I had just started growing in my faith; I was coming to know GOD and not just knowing about HIM.  I liked the feeling of seeking HIM, serving HIM, having HIM use me for HIS glory and to touch lives.  But where was HE?

I was nowhere near where I am in CHRIST today and this was a painful test.  I went to HIM non-stop asking HIM to show me HIS presence.  And then it happened that warmth, joy, the touch and the hand of GOD that I had longed to feel was there and joy filled my heart in the crevices that had been broken.  

I think sometimes we get caught up in our circumstances, in our storms and we become paralysed and forget that HE is with us in the midst of it all and we let the paralysis turn into fear and the fear puts a distance between GOD and us and that’s when we feel that sense of separation.  The distance is quickly resolved when we realize we are in the palm of HIS hands always and that HE’s never left us. 

If you’ve felt separated from GOD let me tell you, there’s no such thing.  There’s no reality in this statement because NOTHING CAN SEPARATE US FROM THE LOVE OF GOD.  Romans 8:35,37-39.  35 Can anything ever separate us from CHRIST’s love? Does it mean HE no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? ” ^[a]) ³⁷ No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through CHRIST who loved us.  ³⁸ And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from GOD’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, ^[b] neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from GOD’s love. ³⁹ No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of GOD that is revealed in CHRIST JESUS our LORD.

Be anxious for nothing, HE IS WITH YOU!