Reading · UNTET | HERED with Author Jessica Redmerski

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I highly recommend watching the video for this post, located at the end. Otherwise, you’ll miss my argument with an angry squirrel.

Also, I apologize for the “bad writing,” but I took the text from an unscripted audio file and didn’t want to change it too much from the original.

Me in Burns Park, North Little Rock, Arkansas - October 21, 2025

Every time I cry from sadness or grief, every time I get angry, no matter what the reason, every time I feel nothing but sorrow and despair, even for a moment, the enemy claps.

He enjoys it when we worry, when we fear. He delights in it because he knows he has successfully drawn us away from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Even if only for a moment, he revels in those times. And I am tired of being tired. Tired of allowing darkness to consume everything I am—every part of me—until it suffocates the woman God intended me to be.

The woman I want to be for Him.

Today, I choose to fight for that woman, with every bit of strength I have. It’s time I take back the life God gave me and live for Christ in the way I didn’t realize I hadn’t been.

I can do all the right things: read the Bible, go to church, have fellowship, and leave behind the secular life. I can pray daily, through tears of sadness or joy—I can do all these things.

But if I still live in the shadows, if I let the enemy press me further beneath his foot, pulling me away from Christ, then none of it matters.

I don’t want to live like that anymore.

Photo by me - Burns Park, North Little Rock, Arkansas - October 21, 2025

I don’t want to be sad.
I don’t want to be depressed.
I don’t want to be angry, afraid, or anxious.

I don’t want to walk through life with slumped shoulders and a lowered head.

I want the world to look at me and see someone who lives for Christ. But I can’t do that if I keep letting the darkness consume me. I know I have my moments, and sometimes they last longer than they should, but I don’t want to let that happen anymore.

I want to focus on the beautiful and the good. I want to live in Philippians 4:8—on whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, and praiseworthy.

I want to focus on good things, not just in the light, but especially in the dark.

(See the video at the end for visuals.)
Are you threatening me? Bring it on! He really is. He’s mad that I’m on his territory.
The squirrels out here are big and red and not afraid of people. They own the place.
There’s no place in the world I love more than this—except Greers Ferry Lake in Arkansas. Burns Park is a close second, and that will never change.

It’s chilly today. It was cold this morning, and I loved it. I’m wearing a sweater and a turtleneck, and the wind is blowing softly. It’s so beautiful. I want this to be my everyday—even when it’s not.

This is my soft hallelujah.

Most days, I feel too weak and exhausted by this world to lift my head, my eyes, or my hands. And when I finally can, everything feels robotic—my movements, my thoughts, my emotions. They’ve become something foreign to me, like they don’t even belong. But I wear them anyway, like something that doesn’t fit.

I’ve lived that way my whole life—so familiar with the darkness that it became comfortable. Anything else, anything other than sadness, depression, grief, or sorrow, felt uncomfortable. And that’s exactly what the enemy wanted.

But I don’t want to live that way anymore.

They say if you keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different result, that’s insanity. I think they’re right.

So, this is my new motivation: to renew my mind and my heart—to live differently.

And I know I can do this only with Christ. Only through Christ.