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Author	: Bill Kochman
Publish	: Oct. 18, 2025
Update	: Oct. 18, 2025
Parts	: 03

Synopsis:



Let me begin by saying that this will be a very personal series, because I will be sharing some things in it which I would probably not share under any other circumstances. As some of my longtime readers will already know, aside from my very public online evangelization endeavors, I actually tend to be a very private individual. I usually keep to myself, even with my neighbors who live around me. I am, of course, pleasant when I come across one of them, but I don't go out of my way to associate with any of them on a regular basis. I don't attend social gatherings such as birthday parties or fiestas, or visit house-to-house, or do anything similar. In other words, that is just not me.

However, due to some heartbreaking comments I recently read on one of the social networks which had been written by an elderly online friend, I have decided to open up my personal life just a little more, because I feel compelled to share the following thoughts with you, my online friends, and my fellow Christian brethren. It is my hope that what I share here will both motivate and encourage those of you who may need it, and for certain others, hopefully shake you out of any similar state of depression in which you might possibly currently find yourself.

Without revealing a lot of identifying details concerning this particular online friend -- their name will obviously not be shared in this series -- let me just say that they are elderly but younger than myself. They live alone. They own an old, sick dog which is now their primary companion and the sole love of their life. They feel totally rejected by their own family who lives a distance away from them. In fact, this person is now so depressed and bummed out due to their circumstances, that they have convinced themselves that they no longer have any reason to live. They say that their life is now just one monotonous, boring event after another, and that nothing ever changes. Sadly, they have even desired that God remove them from this Earth before their dog dies.

Now, to give you an idea of exactly how deep their state of depression has become, I'm going to share a few exact quotes which I extracted from their online comments. Being as this information was posted publicly, I see no problem in sharing this individual's actual words with you. However, before I do that, allow me to share another very important point that is directly related to this current discussion.

My dear friends, we all need to bear in mind that whenever we choose to share something publicly on the Internet, such as on one of the popular social networks, that information is out there, and it will remain out there. There is no way to take it back, or to try to conceal it, or to claim that we never said it. Yes, we can remove a post or comment from one of the platforms on which we participate, but that does not necessarily mean that other social network participants will not see it in other parts of that same social network. The social network gurus make this point rather plain in their terms of service and usage policies.

Let me give you a few simple examples. If you make a post on a social network, and somebody decides to share it, or even more, if they choose to copy and paste your comment to their own space instead of using the "Share" link or button, even if you delete that post or comment from your own timeline or page, your post or comment may STILL remain in circulation. Maybe you decided that what you had said was too offensive, too controversial, or perhaps too personal. So you changed your mind and deleted it from your page or timeline. Well, as I just said, once it is out there, it is OUT there, and you will just have to live with the consequences if it comes back to haunt you.

Let me share another clear example of something else which I personally experienced myself a number of years ago on one of the social networks. As some of you fellow netizens will know, some social networks have a practice or feature called "history" where they can choose to share some of your posts from the past. Well, let me ask you a question. If when we delete a certain post from our page or timeline it is truly deleted permanently, how is it then that it can later still appear in a history post? Please give some thought to that.

So the important lesson that we can learn from this is that we all need to be very careful regarding what we post in the first place. We need to carefully and prayerfully think it through, and consider the potential consequences of our words, BEFORE we post them. In the wise words of the Bible, none of us should be rash or quick to speak with our mouths, or post on the social networks, because we may live to regret it. It may eventually embarrass us, or worse. Please consider the wisdom which is found in the following set of Bible verses:

"Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer."


"In the multitude of words there wanteth [lacks] not sin: but HE THAT REFRAINETH HIS LIPS IS WISE."


"He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, it is folly and shame unto him."


"He that hath no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls."


"A fool uttereth all his mind: but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards."


"BE NOT RASH WITH THY MOUTH, and LET NOT THINE HEART BE HASTY TO UTTER ANY THING BEFORE GOD: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore LET THY WORDS BE FEW."


"For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned."


"Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, SLOW TO SPEAK, slow to wrath . . . If any man among you seem to be religious, and BRIDLETH NOT HIS TONGUE, but deceiveth his own heart, this mans religion is vain."


"For he that will love life, and see good days, LET HIM REFRAIN HIS TONGUE FROM EVIL, and his lips that they speak no guile:"


Returning to my friend who currently finds themself under a major cloud of depression, as I stated earlier, the quotes I am now going to share with you reveal nothing regarding who this individual is. You would really have to have read these comments for yourself on the right social network, as well as on their own account, to even recognize who this person is. Of course, I'm not about to say. I have to respect their privacy. Thus, they will remain anonymous. But I assure you that these were their exact words:

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And my life really has no reason to be anymore. I do nothing because I am too poor to go anywhere. No one invites me to their home. Plus it's no fun to do everything alone. I only exist. I eat and sleep, empty the trash. Go to the same old [grocery store], go to the same park. Always alone. Nothing new happens ever. Nothing changes . . . I feel lost, alone, invisible, hopeless. If I had a friend to do things with or a male companion . . . I need someone to care about me . . . When I am here I feel like a ghost who is no longer in the world . . . But we just have nothing else to live for . . . I try to have faith that God still loves me . . .

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As I said, I found my friend’s comments very heartbreaking, and I imagine that many of my readers will too. What a sad, depressing, hopeless attitude to have. It reeks of complete and total misery, doesn't it? In the Bible, we find a number of verses where certain people expressed the same kind of hopelessness, either because they realized the vanities and the futilities of this present life, or because they had not yet come to know the Salvation which is freely offered to them through faith in the atoning Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Consider the following set of verses. Beware, because these folks seem to be on a major bummer:

"Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity."


"I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit."


"Therefore I hated life; because the work that is wrought under the sun is grievous unto me: for all is vanity and vexation of spirit."


"O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"


"If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable."


"That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:"


"But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope."


So these depressing emotions and feelings of hopelessness which my friend has been experiencing are not anything new. They have been plaguing humanity since the very beginning of man's creation. In fact, I imagine that the first human pair -- Adam and Eve -- were not feeling too great either after God was forced to eject them from the Garden of Eden due to their rebellion and sin. How would you have felt if you had suddenly found yourself ousted from the most beautiful place on the entire Earth? Downright wretched, I imagine.

Then, of course, there is the Prophet Jonah who temporarily rebelled against the Lord, and refused to go to Nineveh -- the ancient capital of Assyria, and today known as Mosul, Iraq -- in order to warn the people of the Lord's impending judgment against them. Well, as many of my Bible-literate readers will already know, as a result of Jonah's defiance, the Prophet ended up in the belly of a great whale with seaweed wrapped around his head and other nastiness. It was NOT a very nice situation to be in. God was very obviously dealing with Jonah's reluctance to fulfill His Will. Then, in his darkest moment of despair, Jonah repented of his sin and cried out "They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy." -- Jonah 2:8. Let me share that entire chapter with you so that you can really understand what a dismal situation Jonah found himself in:

"Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish's belly, And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me. Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple. The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head. I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O LORD my God. When my soul fainted within me I remembered the LORD: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the LORD. And the LORD spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land."


I am also reminded of the mighty Prophet Elijah. As I point out in a few other BBB articles, evil King Ahab and his very wicked queen wife, Jezebel, were killing the Lord's Prophets left and right. This was due to the fact that earlier, the Prophet Elijah had slain four hundred and fifty of the false prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel in Israel, and now Ahab and Jezebel were after Elijah's hide. They wanted that man dead!

In fact, the moment finally arrived when the Prophet Elijah believed himself to be the only Prophet left alive in Israel during that time. Thus, Elijah was definitely in a state of despair; so much so that he even asked the Lord to take his life from him. The following conversation with the Lord is what occurred after Elijah had fled from Ahab and Jezebel, and gone to Mount Horeb -- also known as Sinai -- where he hid himself in a cave, hoping to escape Jezebel's wrath:

"And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and withal how he had slain all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger unto Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I make not thy life as the life of one of them by to morrow about this time. AND WHEN HE SAW THAT, HE AROSE, AND WENT FOR HIS LIFE, and came to Beersheba, which belongeth to Judah, and left his servant there. But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: AND HE REQUESTED FOR HIMSELF THAT HE MIGHT DIE; AND SAID, IT IS ENOUGH; NOW, O LORD, TAKE AWAY MY LIFE; FOR I AM NOT BETTER THAN MY FATHERS . . . And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God. And he came thither unto a cave, and lodged there; and, behold, the word of the LORD came to him, and he said unto him, What doest thou here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, EVEN I ONLY, AM LEFT; AND THEY SEEK MY LIFE, TO TAKE IT AWAY. And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What doest thou here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, EVEN I ONLY, AM LEFT; AND THEY SEEK MY LIFE, TO TAKE IT AWAY."


Lastly, I am reminded of the dire situation of the Prophet Jeremiah. In fact, more than eight and a half years ago in 2017, I composed a poem -- which I more recently converted into an actual song -- about this very incident. You will find at the URL below:

https://www.bbb-bible.com/Poetry/prophet-jeremiah.html

As I amply describe in the poem and song, Jeremiah began his prophetic ministry in Israel at a very young age. He in fact lived through the reigns of various Jewish kings, and faithfully preached God's warnings to the Israelites for a period of some forty years, right up until the last assault by Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, and his armies, which resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in about the year 587 BC. However, similar to so many other Prophets which the Lord had sent to warn the Israelites, it seems that Jeremiah was NOT a welcomed voice in the land.

As a result, during the reign of the final Jewish king who was named Zedekiah, dear Jeremiah found himself thrown into prison and accused of being a false prophet and a traitor to his own country. This event was due to the jealousy of the false prophets who prophesied of peace and prosperity, and who absolutely hated Jeremiah's guts. In fact, they wanted Jeremiah executed. However, even the prison courtyard wasn't enough for those wicked deceivers. Thus, they had Jeremiah thrown into a pit where he sank into the mud up to his very armpits. Thankfully, he was eventually rescued by a eunuch and friend named Ebedmelech, who was of Ethiopian descent.

In addition to reading my poem and listening to the song, if you want to read the actual story as found in the Scriptures, please proceed to the Book of Jeremiah, chapter thirty-eight. But as you can see by the previous paragraphs, just like so many of the Lord's other Prophets and children, Jeremiah had a very rough go of it. Now, on the surface, it would seem as if he had a justifiable reason to just get discouraged, give up and quit. However, just like the others, he did NOT do so. Jeremiah faithfully executed the tasks which the Lord had given him to do. He did not allow himself to be persuaded by political correctness, by the hatred which was directed at him, or by the life-threatening and perilous situation in which he found himself. He persevered.

I could share a number of other Bible stories with you, but I am sure these ones will suffice. So again, such moments of anguish, despair and hopelessness are nothing new. They have been a part of our human experience for an extremely long time, and, of course, they will continue to be so. But do we need to remain victims to these types of negative emotions? Do we need to let them continually clobber us over the head and keep us in a state of such depression so that we become totally ineffective for the Lord? This is a question which I will directly address later on in this same series.

To continue, while I do find my friend's comments rather heartbreaking, at the same time, I will also say that I do very much relate to them as well, because I find myself in a very similar situation. Allow me to explain. And, yes, this is where I start to get personal. While I do not have a dog, as some of my readers and online friends will already know, I do have two cats -- Polo and Eljio -- which were both born under my bed, nineteen days apart in 2021, to two different sets of parents. Both cats are still in the prime of their lives, being just over four years old each. Similar to my friend’s dog, Polo and Eljio are my constant companions who bring a lot of joy to my life, despite one of them -- Polo the female, of course -- being an absolute dictator. But I love her regardless of her demanding, tyrannical behavior. Other cat lovers will completely understand this. 😂

But concerning these two feline rascals, my perspective is the exact opposite of that of my online friend. While they desire to die BEFORE their dog so that they do not have to watch it suffer in its old age, as much as it would sadden me to have to experience it -- I have suffered pet loss in the past -- my desire is that my cats die BEFORE I do. Why do I feel this way? Well, because I would be concerned with what would happen to them after I am gone from this Earth.

Please understand that my two fur babies have never known any other existence apart from living with me. Neither has ever been outside except for a few times when they were kittens, and when I took them to be spayed and neutered prior to their first birthday. Of course, both of them enjoy sitting on the window sill and basking in the Sun each day, or gazing out the window from the top of the shower stall in order to see the birds, or whatever else might be going on out there. So I and my little apartment are their entire lives. They are very comfortable, and very much loved. This is their little feline kingdom.

So the simple truth of the matter is that absolutely nobody could ever love Polo and Eljio, and care for them as much as I do. There just would not be that same connection were they to be given to someone else following my earthly demise. Or who knows. As other cat owners will know, cats can be rather traitorous with their affections. While our cats do indeed love us -- yes, I believe that cats do have emotions like all animals, and that it is not just a matter of instinct -- it is also an inescapable fact that they're self-centered little opportunists who will take advantage of the situation. Shrewd little manipulators! Ha! 😂

Anyway, given my personal situation -- I live alone with no family members around -- my two feline companions would more than likely either be cast out onto the street, or else be taken to the local pound -- pet shelter -- where they would either eventually die, or else purposely be put down. This would not be because they are sick or anything. In fact, my dearies are in perfect health. Rather, the sad truth of the matter is that in my observation, most folks prefer to adopt cute, little kittens, and not already-mature cats. This is one reason why it can be difficult for pet shelters to find new homes for adult cats and dogs, and why they will end up euthanizing many of them. Sadly, economics do enter the picture.

At any rate, that is why I personally much prefer that my two feline companions pass from this current life before I do, despite the pain, emptiness and loneliness which I would experience at their passing. I will say this. It will be an interesting race, because while my cats are only four years old, I am now in my early seventies. In other words, my cats could possibly have another eleven to sixteen years to go before they meet their demise. But the question is this: Do I really have that long to live? This is something that I do seriously think about. While I sometimes joke that I need to beat Moses and live to be one hundred and fifty years of age in order to complete my work for the Lord, the truth is that only God knows. After all, consider the following group of Bible verses that mention the brevity of our human existence:

"The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away."


"Man is like to vanity: his days are as a shadow that passeth away."


"The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the LORD bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever."


"But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?"


"It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life."


"Then Jesus said unto them, My time is not yet come: but your time is alway ready."


"And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:"


"Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away."


"Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: But the word of the Lord endureth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you."


So as you can plainly see, contrary to the popular, secular opinion which erroneously claims that we can each determine our own length of time on this Earth by what kind of diet we maintain, or what level of exercise we perform, what miracle foods we consume, what pharmaceutical drugs we take, or what vitamin supplements we ingest, the Scriptures inform us that it is God alone who determines the length of our sojourn on this planet. When He says that our time is up, then our time is up, and that is the end of it.

Do any of the aforementioned things really help in any way to extend one's life? The older I become, the more doubtful I become that any of it is true. Of course, the promoters of such products and services don't want you to know that. After all, money and profit are their gods, and lies and deception are the standard tools of their craft. They want you as a customer for life. Thus, they will do everything within their power to convince you of the effectiveness of their products.

Sadly, I have known people who will swear by some of these products. They will tell me how absolutely great they feel after using one of these items or services. Personally -- and I know that some of my readers won't like to hear this -- I think that in some cases, it is all in their mind. I believe that they actually psyche themselves into believing that a certain product is having some positive effect on the quality of their life. In other words, it is all imaginary. They want to believe, so in their case, it is so, regardless of the truth.

Yet at the same time, I also believe that the promoters of some of these questionable products add certain ingredients to them which will give the individual a temporary boost in their energy level, or maybe a certain feeling of euphoric wellness. Whether that ingredient is caffeine, some type of sugar compound, or perhaps a certain combination of chemical additives, or some other stimulant, the end result is that the user becomes convinced that the product is working as advertised. Thus, they become addicted to it, and become a customer for life. Wow! It sounds just like drug addiction, doesn't it?

Please go to part two for the continuation of this series.

⇒ Go To The Next Part . . .

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