a good friend of mine came to me this weekend and told me that she doesn't think she believes in God anymore. To say she has had a difficult life would be the understatement of the year. She is a rape victim, an abuse victim, her father is an alcoholic, her mother has had several affairs on her father, she lost her best friend 2 years ago in an accident involving a gun, she has struggled with cutting herself, drugs, alcohol, and eating disorders, and at the moment she is sick with something the doctors can't figure out (so she is in and out of multiple doctors getting tests done frequently and still doesn't know what is wrong) .
She had been doing better. She has stopped cutting, drinking, doing drugs, and had been eating better. She got out of the abusive relationship and has been able to stay away even thought she "loved him," despite what he did to her. I had noticed her starting to drift backwards. She didn't start back up on her old habits, (except maybe the eating disorder. She has lots of reasons for why she gets sick so frequently, I don't really know what to believe), but she was getting more and more depressed and she was doing things that she often did before she gave in and let these addictions take over. She tells me now that she doesn't see how God could let all this happen to her. She doesn't understand why He let her get raped, let he hurt herself, let so many people who she thought cared about her hurt her. I've tried to explain to her that God gave us free will, and we all get the joy of paying not only for our own decisions, but for everyone else's as well. She understands that, but she won't latch onto it. She says she wants to believe, but she feels so far from him and "doesn't think it's for her."
I don't know where to go from here, so I thought I should get some random people's advice. I feel God wanting to speak through me, so I'm giving him every opportunity to get what he has to say to me.
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I wish I knew how to help! I really do! A big thing you can do is just be there for her and pray for her. Bad things happen to good people all the time. That's Satan's work in the world. But somehow, you need to help her know and believe with all her heart and soul that God will help her get through it all, if she'll only call upon Him and allow Him to help er. If she turns to God, He will help her find the strength within herself to keep going despite all the awful crud that's going on.
And that's comin' at ya' from yer local redneck hippie.
Be the light in the darkness for her. be the one she can look to, and see something different. IF nothing else, thats the best thing you do with her. im doing a little of that myself. its not easy. ill be praying for you guys. =]