Meet JoHanna Wegner

Hello, my name is JoHanna Wegner and I’m a senior in high school this year. Since becoming a senior, the devil has thrown trial after trial my way in hopes to sever my relationship with God. Some of these challenges will affect me for the rest of my life, such as mental health.

When I was twelve, I was diagnosed with depression and recently I was diagnosed with Emotional Intensity Disorder (EID), also known as Borderline Personality Disorder. This basically means that my emotions could change severely in a split second. I could go from happy, to extremely depressed, to extremely angry, all within minutes, without a cause.

Since starting my mental health journey, God has still remained faithful and revealed Himself more to me during such hard times. Even though it absolutely stunk to go through all this, looking back I see that God was using these new chapters in my testimony to glorify Him even better. I’ve become more involved in the church and learned to greatly appreciate the blessing of worshiping freely with like-minded people.

When I first entered the student ministry at Faith Bible, I went for two reasons: I wanted to see my friends and my parents made me. But slowly after a while, my heart warmed up to the fact that God wanted a genuine relationship with me. Now I went to church for a different reason, to know and understand God better and to strengthen my faith.

By being in the student ministry, I was able to find people who could teach and guide me through my walk with Jesus. This included the student ministry leaders, small groups, and eventually the youth worship team. All the people I was able to meet through this ministry are such a blessing, not just to me but to the students that attend Faith Bible. They encouraged and prepared me to live a life in a world that is out to get me for my faith.

While navigating my renewed faith in high school, one thing that God really impressed on my heart was learning to trust Him completely. When my mental health got worse, He told me to trust Him. When I lost all my friends, He said, “Trust me.” When my plans for my future fell through, God kept telling me to trust Him. At first, trusting God felt strange, it felt like I should’ve been doing something, but God had every single thing handled. Every time I trusted Him with life, the stronger my faith in Him got. It also strengthened my relationship with Him.

By putting my absolute trust in Him, I was able to see God work in both big and small ways. It gives my soul peace that I can’t really explain. With God, I no longer become anxious, because I know God’s there for me, through thick and thin. I’m able to live life boldly for Him because He taught me to surrender completely to Him. By entrusting Him with my burdens, life becomes a whole light brighter and more hopeful.