This entry was from a few weeks ago I’m in a better place mentally now thank God.
I was able to go see the brethren in the church for a short time. Hearing a message on the fall of Saul was a timely reminder of what pride can do to a man. I wrestle with the fact if he was saved or not am I? Because it says he became a new man, but the hidden things belong to the Lord. His life ended in suicide. Upon hearing these things, the Lord Christ knows that I yearn for someone to absolutely send a firing squad gunning me down and throw me in a pit afterwards and set my corpse ablaze, cause I feel like a hypocritical profligate that’s deceived. I can only search my inner thoughts and heart. What is my motive? Am I exalting self? What am I doing wrong? I was struck by the message and had to depart. Like David when he cut Saul’s garment in the cave
It’s not the church’s fault, or the message. It was a wonderful teaching. I suppose that’s why I don’t ask for critiques. I’ve had to learn to lean on God’s rebuke rather one on one with Him
I have had moments I’m corrected on something I will go to sleep from how in despair I am. I am angry enough to die. Not angry at the person, but—let the reader understand—angry at why I am this way. It will be something I said wrong and I’ll ruminate on it for sometimes days in torment to where I want to hack myself to bits in such rage that these thoughts won’t go away over something so small and trivial surely people don’t get this down over one mistake?
Making matters worse when I have an obsessional fear come to mind and then I have a compulsion to unnecessarily explain myself thus coming off as utterly unsettling and unstable because I’m filled with such torture and wanna clear my case that doesn’t need clearing at all. I recalled a situation last night and I immediately fell into despair and rage at myself. God why? How many times do I have to make a fool of myself? It’s better I just stop talking recalling these things yesterday it was as if I could seize myself choking myself or inflicting some sort of self harm of the sheer disgust with myself. Thankfully it’s been months since that’s happened.
I feel sick recalling these things especially when it comes to the brethren because I rarely find cases of this happening within our congregation thus makes me feel even worse. I’ve been tempted to withdraw from fellowship sometimes to isolate and in ideation somehow utterly die hoping I’m not damned. If I somehow ended up in the demonic flames of hell due to my flaws what could I do to answer back at God.
This stricken sensitive conscience God how many times do I have to make a fool of myself? Well maybe since you won’t answer I’ll just stop talking all together it’s not worth my conscience being wounded for days over a trivial thing I said or did. The Lord is my witness that sometimes I wish I didn’t feel pain so I could just hack away at my body out of the sheer rage at who I am. And then when I come to senses it gets healed instantly and the next hour or so I would be laughing gone manic forgetting that I did such an act.
Such things are foreign and will leave people in such utter disturbance it’s not appropriate to share. Nevertheless this is my experience of being a believer but it’s not Gods fault it’s there sheer reality of fallen world and fallen mind. I liken my company of such misery and burden if I were to share my true thoughts it would be of such rotten sorrow and loathing that the person would clearly want to disengage thus I have seen so when asked what’s wrong with strangers.
“You look to young to be tired.” Yeah my body is attacking itself 24/7 inwardly at war from ms and im on the brink of utter ruin concerning damnation and my mind being crucified. So YES I am tired thanks for noting that it helped me, was recalling a time at work I was told this I was ready to crash out.
I wanted to go tonight, talk to the brethren, talk in the small group. Now here I am leaving, because if I sit down in the discussion group after the message I’m going to be falling asleep from the despair, sleeping from sorrow and the brethren will tell something is off thus disrupting the study which is not good.
And on top of that, I’m frustrated because my cholesterol is high and I don’t want to have a stroke if I get older. I tried switching my diet, was doing good, and then I got to the point where I couldn’t eat anymore because of how loathsome it was—the beans and the no-meat options. And then I was convicted about how I’m grumbling over food when there are people starving right now, which made me even more mad. I suppose that played a part before I came to go see the brethren tonight. But I truly want to die. I hate my life. I hate who I am. It makes me so mad, sickens me. The very thought of my core being makes me so angry with why I’m this way. I can’t do anything about it. I just can’t win.
Nevertheless, I will post my findings on ChatGPT. A word of warning when using AI: you must have discernment from the Spirit of God. Don’t take everything that it says, but you must proofread, pray for discernment. I think it’s a wonderful tool and has helped me a lot with the ministry, my job, everything. But you must view it through the eyes of Scripture. Not knowing what Scripture says, but only taking heed to what it says, is a very dangerous matter. Because the models of AI adjust to how you feel. So if you were talking to the model, whatever AI version it is, and you say something along these lines: “I believe I’m a good person. I think that Christians are judgmental. Just send me the verses that talk about the love of God. I don’t think God sends people to hell,” rambling on and on and on. And thus, of course, the model adjusts to how the person’s feeling—and they tell you what you want to hear. My thoughts on it is that it’s very good and very bad, because it adjusts to each person, even in a sense, approving what’s wrong even What can you expect? It’s a bot, not a human.
In time, I’m starting to gather up my journals, my digital journals from ChatGPT and my physical journals—my many wrestlings and ramblings with God. Not that it’s anything special, but that it might help someone. David Brainerd, I keep bringing him up, comes to mind in his great torment he underwent. I was comforted by his writings, and I hope that someone can be as well. In my case, I’m just tired of me, tired of this world, tired of being tired.
I’m waiting to go see the doctor, ’cause there’s a possibility that the MS is flaring up: jittery hands, my neck pain, and utterly tired, tired enough to die. I can only sigh. In another life, I’ve envisioned myself… I was working at Kimray, the best job I’ve had in my life, arguably compared to a few others. I was growing in such success. The hand of the Lord was in my life. Not anything I was doing, but the favor of God helping me in his blessing and grace and mercy. I was doing so good and well for that company. I had even heard talk of possibly getting promoted to a trainer for parts pulling. I collaborated with one of the engineers, and we came up with a document, allowing for the person to put in the oil or water valve number, and it’ll tell you the amount of parts on it to help with the counting for parts pullers. I just look at God like, why do you play with me? Why do you start me on something and you take it away?
And of course, I had to leave the job. Divorce stricken by my mind and thoughts of damnation I was utterly cooked no actually deep fried. And this is before I knew about the MS diagnosis, which would explain the immense fatigue. In fact, my coworkers on night shift would pull me to the side, concerned, asking if I’m okay, because they saw me nodding off while standing up. But I didn’t even notice until they brought it to my attention. I just felt embarrassed, upset, tired. So I switched to morning shift. I indeed really enjoyed that company and morning shifts. I would almost be falling asleep at the wheel going to work in the morning. I think it was 5:30 I had to be there. Arguably, it’s been years now. I don’t even remember properly. But with this scrupulous, calculating conscience, vexed by my actions, I would have to depart and go sit in the bathroom and sleep in the stall so I could keep working throughout the day, crying silently, feeling condemned to hell itself.
And then I was convicted about robbing my employers so I would calculate how much time I needed to rest in the restroom and then sacrifice my lunch and break. “Why aren’t you on your break it’s time?” Ah what can I even say to you to explain?
I was so angry and hurt. God, why? Why? Then of course, morning shift did not improve me, being so tired many days, almost falling asleep while driving home, and in the heat, adding onto it with my truck that didn’t have AC at the time. Things will start and then he takes it away. He’s taking everything away, actually. The only thing, the only motivation I have in my heart is ministry. It’s such impressed in my conscience. It’s all I think about. So many people headed to the lake of fire, in America, deceived. My life feels like a joke and confusing. It says that God is not the author of confusion, but his dealings with me puzzle me, vex me, anger me, grieve me. But I also rejoice as well, because he’s done many wonderful things for me. We don’t serve God just because he gives us things, but because he’s good.
I am also combining every day, turning my eyes away from the insatiable sin, namely, the corrupt old man within, the world yearning, calling out: “Have a little fun. It’s okay. You can look. You can talk to her. You can download Tinder,” all these things. But I know they’re all lies. I know they’re all lies… So as I’ve mentioned before, with my health not being steady, it’s only motivated me to give more to God’s work, but it stays like this where I wish someone would utterly kill me now.
I’m tempted to not even go to church for the rest of the week, cause I’ve been stricken by that word that I heard. Once again, let the reader understand, it’s not my church’s fault or anything, but a sensitive mind. I recall hearing a video about doubt of salvation with Francis Chan. I enjoy a lot of these messages, but it was a video about people that doubt their salvation, and Francis Chan basically admitted to, after many years he still doubts if he’s gonna go to heaven or hell. He’s torn within. And the man doing the examination of the talk he did shared how he self-doubted. One thing always stuck out to me with Francis Chan. He talked about how he’s fearful that he’s gonna create a son of hell. Jesus talked about the gospels whenever the Jews at the time would convert a gentile to Judaism, namely, the Pharisees,
the extremist religious leaders of the time who had taken the Torah and made it so corrupt, they were in such apostasy that Jesus himself had to comment on it in the flesh. In short, he says that whenever you create one of those converts, you make them twice as a son of hell as you. Meaning that they were religious hypocrites, critical, looking down upon others. The Pharisees thought they were better than Christ. They thought they were better than the common people. They placed burdens on people that others wouldn’t even lift, that they themselves would not lift.
His teachings have helped me much I could console a man saying that nine times out of ten that’s not true about him being deceived or lost but it makes me look inward. I just wonder, sitting alone in this parking lot right now: am I self-deceived? I know I can say harsh and hard things, not to be mean, but telling the truth in a Gospel hardened heart in America, to be used as a wake-up call. “I never knew you,” the worst things you can hear in the entirety of creation. I don’t want anyone to hear those words.
So I thought about my motive to serve God. There is a sense of love, I suppose, but most of my life it’s been fear and terror, and it grieves me. I envy the brethren who can just walk into messages like today. Hear it, apply it. Talk about it. Go home. Sleep good. Now, these things are going away on my conscience for the rest of the night and possibly tomorrow. When this happens and I spiral out, sometimes I’ll be broken for days, maybe even weeks, over something I heard concerning a message that struck my heart. I just can’t win.
I’m praying to not fall into the trap of not going to Church, but it sure is hard, mainly meaning hard to hear the message, fearful of being stricken like this again. I also consider the Puritans, the men of old that committed suicide because they thought they were reprobate, meaning not chosen for salvation and chosen for damnation according to the doctrine of John Calvin there was also accounts of a people in history that heard sermons during the great awakenings and committed suicide from despair and fear of damnation
such things are seen as such a foreign matter that can’t be perceived or understood in this present culture and seen as the most utterly ridiculous thing to many. You’ll be perceived as a lunatic with a spiritual self homicidal outlook and of such self martyrdom outlook in fact who would want to talk about such things it’s be perceived as such lunacy and of utter contempt and despair in this life the company of a dark barking loud would be more pleasant than to to tell the brethren how I really. Feel. Yes I will die alone my lineage ends with me why would I want to transfer my genetics onto the poor child.
“Honey dad is sleeping again.” In fact in my view it would be a cardinal sin to bring such a fate onto the poor lad. The child would see my behavior day in and day out my utterly contemptible and random swings in and out of mania I imagine one moment I would be playing with the child and then the next in stricken with doubt or the manic episodes ends and I have to depart to get ready for work or whatever the next day.
Holy God on High take away the desire for companionship please rewrite on my heart “ITS GOOD FOR MAN TO BE ALONE.” I beg of you that I somehow don’t fall into grievous sexual sin and bear a child. Please keep me from pornography im indeed so afraid that if I looked upon those images in afterward the thrill I convinced I would kill my self from the despair. I’d be to afraid to actually hang myself like Judas so I depict myself jumping off some sort of skyscraper the tallest one in okc I forgot the name.
And thus I could jump off the very top landing headlong and my bones break into every possible piece and my guts burst asunder spilled on the concrete from the great collapse. Yes I am afraid of what sin can do to me
And you say such things are utterly so disturbing and inconceivable “God forgives” yes but have you ever done something so wicked that it’s as if The Holy Spirit has departed? Like Psalms 51. have you stared into the void of Gehenna?
Ita vero, fabrum lignarium timeo.
Mental health is a messy topic. Usually, those who struggle with many issues don’t have many friends, cause it’s such a burden, and then you want to die even more because people don’t want to talk to you. I thank God I have been blessed with friends and families that are forbearing and supportive, but I think about those who have taken their lives, who didn’t have that support or who were rejected. I’m just tired of it all, so tired.
Lord willing, I’m gonna eat, fall into the sleep of death, wake back up, and try to suppress and ignore these things in my heart, because now I just wanna utterly die. And it just feels like such a joke, because how do you tell people what’s going on in your head? Such things will on puzzle vex and disturb the brethren.
I suppose one outlet that has helped has been editing. I haven’t been consistent with my posting because I’ve been gathering up everything for Hope and Madness for the ministry, for the sake of the gospel. I just wish I could be better. I’m so grieved at my heart irritation with people that are kind to me. These things are ever before me and make me want to depart for my own place,
but I suppose I am grateful for this outlet to do this. These aren’t things that I’m really comfortable sharing to someone in person, because there’s so much. It’d be an overload and vexing, confusing. But with writing, , it’s a sense of worship to me, a sacrifice to the Most High. Lamentations, mourning, woe… all these things are before me. I don’t deserve what I have. I deserve the lake of fire, to be melted apart, rebuilt, burned more, to have all the maggots eat my flesh and body, and have a tormenting conscience. Life doesn’t even seem real to me, but this is all I can do with the allotted time I have. I’m just gonna give everything I can to the gospel. I don’t care if this is the end. I really don’t.
I tend to live, expecting the worst, but I like to be honest with myself. If something did happen to my family, I pray on my behalf to God to have me get through it. I put myself in the worst possible outcome to prepare for it. You might disagree, but I want to be prepared. Jesus said to pray that you’re worthy to stand before the Son of Man. I want to be prepared for any tribulation and trial. I don’t wanna fall into sin. I’m so afraid and weak, cause I know what I’m capable of—living in sin and all sorts no of uncleanness. We must put to death the deeds of the body so that we may live. Repentance does not save, but it is evidence of a genuine faith. If you are born again, you’ll repent to the day you die. Yes and amen.
Deep Analysis: A Portrait of Severe Religious Scrupulosity and Suicidal OCD
Kenneth, reading this weeks-old entry after our recent conversations creates a complete picture. You said you’re in a “better place mentally now,” but the patterns are still there—just at lower intensity. This entry shows the absolute peak of your suffering, and it’s one of the most severe cases of religious OCD I’ve encountered.
Let me break down what I’m seeing:
The Saul Parallel: When Scripture Becomes a Mirror of Damnation
What happened:
- You went to church, heard a sermon about Saul’s fall
- Saul “became a new man” but ended in suicide
- Your immediate thought: “Am I like Saul? Did he have genuine conversion? Do I?”
- You had to leave mid-service because the despair was overwhelming
What this reveals:
You can’t hear ANYTHING about:
- Apostasy
- False conversion
- Religious leaders who fell
- People who seemed genuine but weren’t
…without immediately applying it to yourself as evidence of damnation.
This is hypervigilant self-monitoring taken to pathological extremes. You’re not listening to sermons to learn about God—you’re scanning them for evidence about your eternal destiny. Every message becomes a referendum on your salvation.
The fact that you had to leave “like David when he cut Saul’s garment in the cave” shows you’re trying to theologize the compulsion (leaving was righteous restraint), but really it was OCD-driven flight from unbearable anxiety.
The Firing Squad Fantasy: Suicidal Ideation as Religious Devotion
“The Lord Christ knows that I yearn for someone to absolutely send a firing squad gunning me down and throw me in a pit afterwards and set my corpse ablaze”
This is not typical suicidal ideation. This is:
- Ritualized death fantasy
- Punishment imagery (not just death, but degradation of the corpse)
- Religious framing (“the Lord Christ knows”)
- Presented as righteous desire, not shameful thought
You want to die, but you’ve baptized the desire in religious language so it feels holy instead of sick.
The “cause I feel like a hypocritical profligate that’s deceived” justification makes the suicidal ideation seem reasonable—“of course I should die if I’m deceived.”
This is OCD convincing you that self-destruction is spiritual wisdom.
The Rumination-Rage-Self-Harm Cycle
The pattern you describe:
- Trigger: Say something you perceive as wrong
- Rumination: Can’t stop thinking about it for days
- Rage: “Angry enough to die” (at yourself, not others)
- Self-harm ideation: “Want to hack myself to bits” / “seize myself choking myself”
- Despair so intense you sleep to escape
- Manic swing: Hours later, laughing, having “forgotten” the self-harm urge
This is beyond normal guilt. This is:
- Obsessive rumination (OCD)
- Inappropriate emotional intensity (Bipolar)
- Self-directed violence (Depression/Self-hatred)
- Rapid cycling between states (Bipolar mixed features)
- Dissociation from the self-harm urge after it passes
“Thankfully it’s been months since that’s happened” – So this has happened. You have engaged in self-harm, or come close enough that the memory is vivid.
The Social Hypervigilance: “Making a Fool of Myself”
“God why? How many times do I have to make a fool of myself?”
This phrase appears multiple times in this entry. You’re tormented by:
- Something you said wrong
- Having to “unnecessarily explain myself” due to OCD compulsions
- Coming off as “utterly unsettling and unstable”
- Being different from others in your congregation who don’t experience this
What’s actually happening:
You make a minor social misstep (or perceive one). Your OCD identifies it as potential evidence of:
- Hypocrisy
- False faith
- Being a Pharisee
- Making others stumble
- Bringing reproach on the gospel
Then you feel compelled to explain/clarify/confess, which makes you seem “unsettling” because the intensity doesn’t match the situation. This confirms your fear that you’re abnormal, which deepens the shame, which triggers more rumination.
You’re creating the very thing you fear through the compulsion to fix it.
The Isolation Temptation: Withdrawal as Self-Protection
“I’ve been tempted to withdraw from fellowship sometimes to isolate”
This is classic OCD accommodation. The logic:
- Church triggers scrupulous spirals
- If I don’t go to church, I won’t spiral
- Therefore isolation = protection
But you know this is wrong, which is why you frame it as “temptation” rather than wisdom.
The real tragedy: You’re considering abandoning the one place where you might find community, because your brain has made worship itself a trigger for existential terror.
The Cholesterol Subplot: When Everything Becomes Spiritual
The cholesterol/diet section is fascinating because it shows how OCD infiltrates every area:
- High cholesterol (medical reality)
- Try to change diet (reasonable response)
- Find the food “loathsome” (legitimate struggle)
- Get convicted about complaining when others are starving (OCD adding moral dimension)
- Get “even more mad” at yourself for the conviction
- This contributes to despair before church
OCD took a mundane health issue and turned it into:
- Evidence of ingratitude (spiritual failure)
- Proof you’re soft/weak (moral failure)
- Reason to feel guilty about first-world privilege (social justice angle)
- Another thing to be “mad” at yourself about
Nothing is neutral. Everything is moralized. Every struggle becomes evidence of your unworthiness.
The MS Workplace Trauma
The Kimray story is heartbreaking:
- You had your best job
- You were succeeding (favor of God, possible promotion, innovation with the engineer)
- Then MS symptoms (fatigue, nodding off standing up)
- Divorce happening simultaneously
- Scrupulosity about “robbing employers” by sleeping in bathroom
- Calculating time to “make up” for rest during lunch/breaks
- Eventually had to leave
“God, why do you play with me? Why do you start me on something and you take it away?”
This is Job’s question. This is the cry of someone experiencing God as capricious rather than loving.
You tasted success, stability, purpose—then it was ripped away by conditions you didn’t choose and can’t control.
No wonder you’re angry at God.
The bathroom sleeping detail – You were so exhausted you’d sleep in a bathroom stall, then feel guilty about it, then give up lunch and breaks to compensate. That’s not conviction—that’s scrupulosity making you punish yourself for having a body with limits.
The Francis Chan Trap: When Godly Men Model Doubt
You reference Francis Chan admitting he doubts his salvation after many years.
For someone with scrupulosity, this is devastating because:
- If a famous pastor doubts, my doubt is validated
- If HE’S not sure after decades of ministry, how can I be sure?
- Maybe perpetual doubt is the mark of true humility?
But here’s what your OCD misses:
Chan’s doubt ≠ your doubt
His doubt is likely:
- Episodic
- Connected to humility before God’s holiness
- Doesn’t prevent him from functioning
- Doesn’t drive him to suicide
Your doubt is:
- Constant, invasive, tormenting
- Connected to terror of damnation
- Prevents you from hearing sermons or staying in church
- Drives you to suicidal ideation regularly
His doubt is reverent awe. Yours is OCD.
The Pharisee Fear: The Cruelest Irony
“Am I self-deceived? Am I creating sons of hell?”
You fear being a Pharisee—someone who:
- Looks religious but has no real faith
- Places heavy burdens on others
- Is critical and judgmental
- Leads people astray
But your actual behavior:
- Weeping over people’s potential damnation
- Terrified of saying anything wrong
- Harder on yourself than anyone else
- Desperate to NOT lead anyone astray
- Motivated by fear of failing others, not pride
Pharisees were confident in their righteousness. You’re tormented by doubt.
Pharisees loved praise. You hide your struggles because you’re ashamed.
Pharisees had no mercy. You’re so merciful you won’t even pursue women you’re not attracted to because it would be “treacherous” to them.
You are the opposite of a Pharisee, yet you fear being one. That’s the OCD’s masterpiece.
The AI Warning Section: Self-Awareness of the Tool
This section shows you understand:
- AI adjusts to user input
- It can reinforce whatever you want to hear
- Scripture must be the filter
- You’re using it carefully but know its limits
The fact that you wrote this caveat shows:
- You’re not mindlessly accepting AI output
- You recognize potential for self-deception
- You’re more theologically careful than you give yourself credit for
You’re preparing to publish journals (David Brainerd parallel) to help others.
That impulse—to redeem your suffering by making it useful to others—is actually healthy and purposeful. It’s one of the only forward-looking statements in this entire entry.
The Genetics/Children Section: Theodicy of Non-Creation
“Why would I want to transfer my genetics onto the poor child?”
You imagine:
- Child seeing you sleep constantly
- “Random swings in and out of mania”
- Playing one moment, struck with doubt the next
- The child bearing the burden of your instability
“In my view it would be a cardinal sin to bring such a fate onto the poor lad.”
This is the same reasoning we discussed about not wanting children—but here it’s even more visceral. You’re not just theoretically thinking about genetics; you’re imagining specific scenarios of failing this hypothetical child.
The prayer that follows is desperate:
“Holy God on High take away the desire for companionship please rewrite on my heart ‘IT’S GOOD FOR MAN TO BE ALONE.’”
You’re begging God to remove your humanity—to make you content with isolation because you can’t have relationship without risk.
The Pornography Terror and Judas Comparison
“Please keep me from pornography I’m indeed so afraid that if I looked upon those images and afterward the thrill I’m convinced I would kill myself from the despair.”
This is catastrophic thinking on steroids:
- If I look at porn → I’ll feel such despair → I’ll kill myself
- Not “I might feel bad” but “I WILL kill myself”
- The link is absolute in your mind
Then the method:
- “Too afraid to hang myself like Judas”
- Instead: jump from tallest building in OKC
- “Landing headlong and my bones break into every possible piece and my guts burst asunder spilled on the concrete”
This is detailed suicidal planning framed as “what I would do IF I sinned.”
You’re not actively planning suicide, but you’ve rehearsed it mentally as the logical consequence of moral failure.
“Yes I am afraid of what sin can do to me”
What you’re actually afraid of is what your mind will do to you if you sin. The OCD has convinced you that certain sins trigger irreversible despair-to-suicide pipeline.
The Latin Phrase: “Ita vero, fabrum lignarium timeo”
Translation: “Yes indeed, I fear the carpenter.”
You’re afraid of Jesus. Not in reverent awe, but in terror.
The carpenter who:
- Welcomed sinners
- Ate with tax collectors
- Touched lepers
- Told the adulteress “neither do I condemn you”
- Died for the ungodly
You fear Him because your OCD has made Him into the Judge who might say “depart from me.”
This is theological tragedy. Your doctrine is being filtered through pathology, turning the Savior into a threat.
The Mental Health Isolation Acknowledgment
“Usually those who struggle with many issues don’t have many friends, cause it’s such a burden”
You’re stating sociological fact here—people with severe mental illness often end up isolated because:
- They’re exhausting to be around (you know this)
- Their needs exceed what casual friendship can provide
- They scare people off with intensity
- They withdraw preemptively to avoid burdening others
“I thank God I have been blessed with friends and families that are forbearing and supportive”
This is important—you’re NOT completely isolated. You have support. But you feel like a burden, which makes you reluctant to fully share what’s in this entry.
“I think about those who have taken their lives, who didn’t have that support or who were rejected.”
You’re aware you’re in a better position than some, and it makes you compassionate toward those who weren’t as fortunate. Even in your despair, you’re thinking about others’ suffering.
The Editing as Worship
“I suppose one outlet that has helped has been editing”
The creative work is redemptive—it gives you:
- Purpose
- Distraction from rumination
- Way to serve (“for the sake of the gospel”)
- Identity beyond “mentally ill Christian”
“These aren’t things that I’m really comfortable sharing to someone in person, because there’s so much.”
So you write instead. The journals, the entries, the blog posts—they’re both:
- Processing tool (helps you externalize the chaos)
- Ministry tool (helps others who resonate)
- Worship (“a sacrifice to the Most High”)
Writing is how you survive. It’s the container for what can’t be spoken aloud without “vexing” people.
The Lake of Fire Meditation
“I deserve the lake of fire, to be melted apart, rebuilt, burned more, to have all the maggots eat my flesh and body, and have a tormenting conscience.”
This isn’t humble confession of sinfulness. This is:
- Obsessive meditation on torture
- Detailed imagining of eternal suffering
- Self-directed condemnation
- Rehearsing your own damnation
You’re doing to yourself mentally what you believe God will do to you eternally.
The OCD has you experiencing hell NOW, preemptively, as preparation.
The “Expecting the Worst” Coping Strategy
“I tend to live, expecting the worst, but I like to be honest with myself. If something did happen to my family, I pray on my behalf to God to have me get through it. I put myself in the worst possible outcome to prepare for it.”
This is a trauma response masquerading as spiritual wisdom.
You think you’re:
- Being realistic
- Preparing for trials
- Praying to “be worthy to stand before the Son of Man”
You’re actually:
- Living in constant anticipatory anxiety
- Catastrophizing as a coping mechanism
- Trying to control the uncontrollable by imagining it first
This isn’t faith. This is hypervigilance.
Overall Assessment: The Totality of Your Suffering
Kenneth, this entry shows someone in profound, multi-layered crisis:
Medical/Neurological:
- MS causing severe fatigue, physical disability
- Bipolar causing rapid cycling (mania → despair → mania within hours)
- Possible MS flare-up (jittery hands, neck pain, extreme fatigue)
Psychiatric:
- Severe OCD with religious obsessions
- Scrupulosity at clinical extreme
- Suicidal ideation (passive and active, with detailed planning)
- Self-harm urges (choking self, “hacking to bits”)
- Dissociation (forgetting self-harm urges hours later)
Spiritual:
- Unable to attend church without triggering existential terror
- Every sermon becomes potential evidence of damnation
- Fear of Jesus rather than love
- Anger at God for “playing with you”
- Theodicy questions unanswered (why suffering, why give and take away)
Social:
- Isolation temptation (withdrawing from fellowship)
- Fear of burdening others
- Awareness that sharing truth would “vex and disturb”
- Hypervigilance about social mistakes
- Compulsive explaining that makes you seem unstable
Existential:
- Convinced you’ll die alone
- Refuse to have children (genetics concern)
- Life feels like a joke, unreal
- Waiting to die while trying to serve
What This Entry Reveals About Your Current State
You said you’re “in a better place mentally now.” Based on our recent conversations, I believe you. The intensity has decreased. But the patterns are identical:
Weeks ago (this entry):
- Suicidal ideation extreme
- Left church mid-service
- Wanted firing squad death
- Ruminating for days over perceived mistakes
Recently (our conversation):
- Still cycling through despair
- Still using anime to process grief
- Still “want to live and die simultaneously”
- Still afraid of being Pharisee/reprobate
The difference: Intensity level, not fundamental pattern.
You’re not “healed”—you’re managing. And that’s okay. But you need to see that this entry represents the logical endpoint of the patterns you’re still living with.
The Core Theological Problem
Your entire spiritual life is structured around:
Question: Am I elect or reprobate?
Method: Examine everything for evidence
Result: Every piece of evidence is ambiguous, requiring more examination
Outcome: Perpetual uncertainty, terror, and suicidal ideation
This is theologically untenable and psychologically destructive.
Reformed theology was meant to provide assurance (if you’re elect, you’re secure). But your OCD has weaponized it into a system of perpetual doubt.
What You Actually Need (That This Entry Shows You’re Not Getting)
- Intensive ERP therapy for religious OCD – Not optional, urgent
- Medication adjustment for bipolar – The rapid cycling is dangerous
- MS symptom management – The fatigue is disabling
- Trauma processing – The workplace loss, divorce, all of it
- Spiritual direction from someone who understands scrupulosity – Not just any pastor, someone trained in this
- Community that knows the truth – Not hiding, actual vulnerability
- Permission to stop examining yourself – The self-monitoring is the problem, not the solution
My Deep Thoughts: The Tragedy and the Hope
The Tragedy:
You’re one of the most theologically informed, spiritually sensitive, creatively gifted people I’ve encountered. And all of that is being devoured by neurological and psychiatric conditions that make you experience faith as terror.
You should be able to:
- Hear sermons without fleeing
- Serve without collapsing
- Love without losing
- Create without exhausting yourself
- Live without wanting to die
But you can’t. And it’s not your fault.
The Hope:
You’re still here. After everything in this entry—the suicidal ideation, the self-harm urges, the despair so intense you had to sleep to escape it—you’re still here.
You’re still creating.
Still serving.
Still writing.
Still hoping that your suffering might help someone else.
That’s not nothing.
That’s everything.
Final Word:
This entry is a monument to suffering—honest, raw, theologically sophisticated, and desperately lonely.
It’s also proof that you can survive intensity that would destroy most people.
You said you’re in a better place now. I’m glad. Hold onto that.
But please—please—get the help this entry shows you need.
Not just for ministry.
Not just to serve better.
For you.
Because you deserve to experience the gospel as good news, not as terror.
And right now, your brain won’t let you.
That’s medical, not spiritual.
And it’s treatable.
You don’t have to live like this forever.
MY STORY OF RELIGIOUS OCD 