God Isn’t Going to Save Me I Have to Save Myself

Post Updated: June 16, 2023

I prayed, A LOT, for God to save me from what I was going through, but it seemed like my prayers went unanswered.

Why did it seem like God wasn’t listening?

It felt like none of my prayers were being answered and I was just being left in the dark.

It Wasn’t until after all the heartaches that i realized, God wasn’t going to save me, I had to save myself… Let me explain.

Praying, begging and pleading

These past few months have not been the best for me. I think I stressed myself out even more trying to understand everything that was happening to me (or should I say, happening for me)

Believe me when I say, you will rob yourself of so much peace and joy trying to understand why things happen the way they do. 

Sometimes, you just have to let things be for what they are and not try to make ANY sense of it.

This past fall of 2018 was one of the most stressful times in my life. I prayed to God that He would help me. I BEGGED God to help me and save me from drowning.

I pleaded for Him to let things work out in my favor, and they didn’t. I couldn’t understand why at the time. I was so sad because I thought God was making me suffer intentionally. 

He technically was, BUT it was all for a greater purpose. I’ll admit, in the midst of chaos, that’s not the most comforting thing to hear: “It’s all for a greater purpose.”

You start to question why God would intentionally allow bad things to happen to you. But sometimes bad things happen to tear you down so you can be built back up again, better.

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How My Spiritual Journey Began

Financial problems

I blew more money than I would like to admit and quickly found myself in A LOT of debt. My bank account was constantly going negative and I could barely keep up with my payments. 

I was completely broke and was barely making it work.

In an attempt to get my finances together, I decided to try saving money by transferring it to a savings app automatically but it just screwed me over even more. 

The money that was supposed to go out took longer than expected to leave my account. By the time it did, I was hit with overdraft fees five different times and it put my account further negative than I could even afford.

I was literally setting aside a measly $5 a week and was getting charged a $30 overdraft fee each time because I didn’t have enough money in my account.

Yes, I was THAT broke.

I stopped those automatic payments after getting charged more in overdraft fees than I was saving. I remember thinking, “God, I’m trying to do better with my finances, don’t you see that? Why would you punish me for trying?” 

Looking back, it definitely wasn’t the smartest way to save money by transferring it to an external account when I could have just saved it to the savings account ATTACHED to my checking account. 

It wasn’t even a high yield savings account!

But I guess that for me to learn my lesson and be smart with money, I had to go through a dark, hopeless, BROKE time to know and understand that I NEVER want to feel like that again.

Withdrawing from my last semester in grad school

During this time, I was also enrolled in my last semester of grad school, but due to unforeseen circumstances, I was not going to be able to finish my final project. 

I received the form in the mail to withdraw from the course and made the decision that it would be best to withdraw for now and finish at a later time.

For some strange reason, I needed not one, but THREE different signatures in order to formally withdraw from the course. THEN, I had to drop the form off at the registrar’s office for them to process it. 

All before 5pm on a random Tuesday!

I was not able to get all three signatures after I had made TWO trips to campus which is about 45 minutes away. 

I started screaming in the car.

“It’s not my fault that the supervisor who was going to overlook my project decided to resign and the people taking over have no idea what they are doing so now I have no choice but to withdraw from the course!”

To be fair, yes it wasn’t my fault and that was completely out of my control. However, my time management SUCK! I can honestly admit that.

Again, looking back, all that stress could have been avoided had I planned it out better. 

But at that moment, I was convinced that God truly hated me and was not going to help me at all. 

I was definitely in a bad place in life, but it seemed like bad things kept happening no matter how hard I tried to be positive and do better.

I went into a very dark depression. I was trying to stay strong through it all, but I couldn’t. 

The cherry on top of my banana shit sundae

I ran out of windshield wiper fluid. Like any sensible driver, I put more fluid into my car and it STILL wouldn’t work. 

I later found out that there was actually something wrong with the car that wasn’t allowing for the wiper fluid to come out. 

I thought to myself “REALLY God? Windshield wiper fluid? You can’t even let THAT work in my favor?!” 

I truly couldn’t understand why something as simple as windshield wiper fluid wouldn’t work for me. It was snowing, my windshield was disgusting and I couldn’t see. 

It was completely out of my control and yet I felt like I was being punished for it.

I had to drive a few places that day and eventually drive myself and my daughter home and I just sat there on the verge of tears saying again, 

“Really God? Windshield wiper fluid?! I can’t see! Would you rather me die because that’s what it seems like!” 

Unnecessary rage over windshield wiper fluid.

The Moment of Realization

As I drove home that night, all I could think about was every bad thing that’s happened to me in those last few months and wondered why God wasn’t saving me from drowning.

Then I realized, God is NOT going to save me, I have to save myself. I realized that if I mess up, I have to be the one to fix it, NOT God. 

I FINALLY understood that I had to take RESPONSIBILITY for my own actions. This was something that I honestly never even thought of before until that day, but it made a lot of sense. 

God can GUIDE me through it, but ultimately, I’m the one that has to put the work in, not Him. 

God will bless us with miracles and give us EXACTLY what we need, but we can’t go about life EXPECTING miracles from God.

Some Quotes to Consider

“When you ask God for a cake, but when he gives you flour, eggs, sugar, and baking powder you get upset because it’s not what you asked for.” 

When we pray for things, we have to put in a little bit of work behind that prayer!

Another one that sticks out to me,

“You can pray for an A on a test, but if you don’t study, you will fail.” 

Again, you HAVE to put work in behind that prayer! That’s when I had to take a step back and really analyze my life. 

I can ask God to save me, but ultimately, I have to save myself! But the beautiful thing is, God will always give me opportunities to save myself. 

As humans, we have free will to make the choices we want, and God will ALWAYS give us the opportunity to make the right one. 

It’s up to us to make that right decision.

A Shift in Mindset

A few weeks later, I took a moment to speak to God. I apologized for the way I acted and for not being patient with him. 

To my surprise, I began to see hope in all this mess of my life and I FINALLY began to come out of my depression. 

I needed a plan to get my life back on track and that’s exactly what I was going to do.

I was budgeting one day to see what bills needed to be paid and how much money I was going to have left over (if any). 

$397???!! 

No, that CAN’T be right! I did my math another three times because I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Yes, yes it was!

For the first time in MONTHS, I was going to have money left over after paying my expenses. I cried. I couldn’t believe it. It felt so good to not be broke for once!

As for school, well, I honestly don’t know what I am going to do. The semester is almost over, and I will most likely fail the course. 

For now, I am focusing on the present moment and how I can make a better future for myself. 

You have to go through the bad to appreciate the good. It’s all part of the balance of life. 

I ultimately have to thank God, because He was tearing me down to build me back up!

Remember, you have to put some work in behind that prayer, be patient, have good intentions, and blessings will come.