I’m continuing the series on praying for people who we love and care about who have some mental health issue, some disorder that perhaps we do not even understand. Today, I need to deal with post-traumatic stress disorder.
What Is PTSD?
I’ve heard some smart biblical scholars get this improper, saying things like, ‘Oh, it’s just grief,’ or something like that. It’s hard for people to know. Let me read you a verse, and that is from Philippians 3, 13, and 14:
“I do not mean to say that I’ve already achieved these items or that I actually have already reached perfection, but I press on to own that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me for getting the past and looking out forward to what lies ahead. I press on to achieve the top of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God through Christ Jesus is asking us.”
Now, it says so clearly we’d like to forget the past and look forward, but a one who’s been traumatized, and that might be definitely someone with a military experience of war, but in addition people who have been abused and have been mistreated, abandoned, have the identical type of symptoms. And they can not forget the past until it’s treated and resolved. Sometimes, we see an individual have flashbacks or nightmares of that traumatic experience. They get triggered, and it becomes so vivid to them that they can not do anything but just shut down because some sound or sight has put them right back into the back where they were before.
Sometimes, you see the person avoiding anything that may remind them of that have. So, they might never wish to be alone with a person or woman, even within the worst situations. And then perhaps they feel so numb that they don’t desire to experience any emotion like love, care, or joy. They don’t care about other people because they can not. They’re so obsessive about attempting to survive themselves. And then there’s the opposite thing: some loud noise or some startling situation might invoke them right into a state of panic or totally shut down.
Post-traumatic stress disorder is a struggle. And if an individual has it, oh, they’re tormented. Day and night. There’s treatment available for this.
It doesn’t just go away. You know, we might love for us to find a way to say in Psalm 55, 22, give your burdens to the Lord, and he’ll deal with you. He is not going to permit the godly to slide and fall.
Well, that is a verse for you who cares about someone, nevertheless it’s a verse for them. And once we are stuck, we’re on this stage of despair. It’s hard for us to do what scripture so plainly tells us to do.
So we would like to wish that perhaps we discover the treatment that is available so we can share that with the person in order that they do not feel like they’re on their lonesome or they’re hopeless because there is no help available. To that end, I need to say a prayer for them. And perhaps you’d say this prayer for them in order that their struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder would not be something that might need to last a lifetime.
A Prayer for Those Suffering from PTSD
Dear Lord, I pray that the Holy Spirit will lead me to be a source of comfort and a source of resources. Show me what could help this person, God, and help me make them that resource. Lord, help me encourage them not to provide up on themselves and to seek out hope that would heal this horrible disorder. God, I pray that if it’s in your will, you’ll immediately heal them or transform them over time as you transform me. Lord, help me at all times be there for them. Help me see that that is about something horrible that happened and never about me. If they mistreat me, Lord, you might be all-powerful. You can do anything. I ask you to be the source of power and strength for this person I like. And Lord, you died in order that nothing in our past would need to haunt us in the longer term.
Lord, I pray that every person struggling on this area would find you as a savior after which find that thing that forestalls them from living the lifetime of redemption and healing. Lord, whether it is in your will, let me be the one to guide them to the sunshine, guide them to your light and your truth that may sustain them as you sustain me and sustain them. I ask all of these items, Lord, in your name. Amen. I hope that prayer helps.
For additional resources, call us at New Life at 1-800-NEW-LIFE. God bless you.
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