state of the Union (or current lack thereof)
so now it's time to trace back how i got here ..... i "came to Christ" out of months of suicidality in november of 2018 and was baptized the following february for just about three years (november 2018-november 2021) i considered myself a Christian. sure, "the World" pressed in on me, with a documentary from my spanish class in spring 2019 being an early source of questions on God's goodness in light of horrific human suffering. but, i talked through this with my family and pressed onwards. i knew i had been saved and what i had been saved from. it also helped that my faith gave me hope for redemption of my own brother's suffering through intense mental health struggles and his eventual death by suicide. this was, essentially, a starting place for years of hope, joy, and intense intermittent anxiety. worship, fellowship, and hormones (attraction to a friend of mine lol) kept me going. scripture reading raised hopes and spawned doubts. but i definitely c
