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When I went to boarding school

My Bible: reasons to believe in the power of the Bible

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'When I went to boarding school aged 13, I had my first episode of depression, though I didn’t have a diagnosis then. I had a total and utter loss of perspective.

I felt cut off from the present, the past and the future. Everything felt completely black. They were different times. I wouldn’t talk to my parents for 12 weeks.

Letters took three weeks. My mum wrote me a letter. It was full of Bible verses including Isaiah 43, Psalm 139 and 2 Timothy 1.6-7. It pretty much saved my life, that letter.

That was the beginning of trying to embed the Bible into my mind so that I could lean on it when I couldn’t trust my own thoughts. Sometimes, when you are depressed, you can’t argue with the thoughts in your head, but you can go through a Psalm instead.

I read and re-read the Bible. It got to the point where I thought it was a bit dreary. That’s so arrogant isn’t it?! So I went and studied it in Vancouver because I didn’t believe that the Bible was really dreary and I didn’t want to live like that for the rest of my Christian life. Now, I feel like there’s more and more of it that I want to investigate.'

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