Good morning…
God has bound into my spiritual “bundle” ninety-five year old Betty Skinner. Let me tell you why her vibrant life is so very important to me.
When I read the original printed version of The Hidden Life, published by Kitty Crenshaw and Dr. Cathy Snapp in 2006, the spirit of the main character, Betty, leapt from the pages to gently hold the hand of my own fainting spirit. In 2015, the Holy Spirit nudged me to meet Cathy, Kitty, and Betty in person. Since then they have each become essential people in my mutually beneficial “bundle.” With various groups studying this holy book in the comfort of our living room, we-women in Atlanta gobbled up the final boxes of the originals, helping to inspire Kitty and Cathy to publish a new edition in 2016 entitled The Hidden Life Awakened.
I was forty-four years old when I first met the original edition in 2007, the wife of a husband beloved by many in our community, a mother of four young children, then six, eight, ten, and twelve, and a woman coming out of a deep depression that changed my life. In the book pages, I experienced the spiritual journey of Betty Skinner, who at age forty-two was trapped in the excruciatingly dark valley of her own depression. Back then, Betty was the wife of a very successful businessman, also the mother of four young kids, and a woman who had neglected her own God-designed soul by frantically piling up good-Christian roles. Her life story hit bottom when her body finally shut down, and she was unable to accomplish the simple task of addressing a single stack of envelopes. God broke through to Betty in new ways after she entered the psychiatric ward of a hospital.
As Kitty and I visited with Betty in her Florida nursing home yesterday, Betty reiterated, “We are all designed by God to develop a healthy body, a serene mind, and a powerful spirit. We have to practice feeding each of these parts separately at first, then we slowly integrate wholeness with the help of God.”
“I went through hell to get there,” Betty explained. “My pain forced me into psychiatric care. I suffered a lot not being a good mother to my children. I was sick, really sick with depression. Satan was trying to extinguish the Spirit of God in me. He almost won. My three months of hospitalization were very difficult. It was like being in prison. Being separated from my family was not easy.”
“We all have a spiritual battle going on within us,” Betty elaborated. “We each go through our personal battles with Satan. How bad do you want to live, to really live fully? Are you going to God every time you desperately need help or are you giving into the pressure of God’s enemy?”
She said, “Early on in our spiritual journey, we give into Satan a lot, whining and complaining, comparing and competing, controlling and condemning ourselves and others. We try to cling to our old life rather than completely surrendering ourselves to the loving purposes of God.”
Betty’s painful battle and the life-and-death spiritual struggle I also experience are amplified in the pages of Scripture. Put on the full armor of God [for His precepts are like the splendid armor of a heavily-armed soldier], so that you may be able to [successfully] stand up against all the schemes and the strategies and the deceits of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood [contending only with physical opponents], but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this [present] darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly (supernatural) places. Therefore, put on the complete armor of God, so that you will be able to [successfully] resist and stand your ground in the evil day [of danger], and having done everything [that the crisis demands], to stand firm [in your place, fully prepared, immovable, victorious] (Ephesians 6:11-13, AMP).
I am not sure I have ever told anyone these details before, but I experienced a showdown with Satan myself. For almost two years I had been wrestling with God through grief, through surrendering my will to His, through suffering with heavy and hollow feelings, day after day, night after night. My long, grueling bout with deep depression began to turn around when I said out loud, “No, God, I am not going to kill myself.” And right before my eyes, in a very real vision in the middle of the night, the “God-costume” Satan was wearing to taunt me, to tempt me, to try to end my life, fell to the ground, exposing the identity of my true opponent. God’s enemy, my enemy, the enemy of the abundant life for which we are all designed slithered away into the darkness to await another opportune time.
Be sober [well balanced and self-disciplined], be alert and cautious at all times. That enemy of yours, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion [fiercely hungry], seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8, AMP).
“Are you going to God who you hardly know or are you going to give into the pressure of Satan, which is a powerful living presence?” Betty wondered with us aloud. “Satan is really trying to keep people from seeing clearly, trying to keep us from awakening into the abundant love of God.”
“Satan had a lot to lose when I began to wake up whole,” Betty smiled a genuine smile.
With so many of us experiencing the palpable presence of God spurred on by the healed wholeness of Betty Skinner, I totally agree with her assessment. The enemy of God knew he had a lot to lose as Betty’s saving story wakes up the vibrant life of Christ in many of us who are following of her courageous footsteps up from the valley of debilitating depression.
…Sue…
