Vanakkam! I’m Sarmishta Venkatesh. I’m a certified Biblical Counselor with the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors (ACBC), the largest organization in the world certifying biblical counselors. I’m married to Pastor Venkatesh Gopalakrishnan and enjoy serving alongside him in mentoring and training the beloved people of Anugraha Reformed Presbyterian Church. I have a spirited 12 year old who is the darling of my heart.

My story was scripted to bring me to this exact point in time, as Scriptures foretells, “to comfort others with the comfort that you have been comforted with by God” (2 Cor 2:4). My hope is that as you read my story, you would find both comfort and hope in Christ, as well as a kindred spirit who has traversed a path similar to yours, whom you can trust.

Coming home to Christ

I’m foremost a hopeless sinner sought after by a relentless Savior whose badge I wear unabashedly: Christian. I grew up in a typical tambram (upper caste Hindu) home where culinary prowess, cultural pride and the gods all craved for attention in an all encompassing way, so much so, that to step out of any ritual line was considered scandalous. Yet I did step out, at 18 years of age, outside the confines of my sanctimonious society. My life was constantly twirling to find a sense of attachment and identity apart from the strict confines of my culture. Yet in all my freewheeling, I was also trying to tether to someone who would bring comfort and companionship to me. Between music bands and swag clubs, nothing in this world could fill that gaping hole in my soul, sin darkening and deepening that abyss with each passing day. On Jan 27, 2002, Christ Jesus did the unthinkable: the Holy God plunged His hand into my muck and rescued me from the whirling abyss I could not pull myself out of. He washed me thoroughly through the sanctifying power of His word and Spirit and made me His own beloved. In one moment, a bolt struck my soul and all my needs coalesced and found its sweet spot in this One Person – Jesus Christ the Righteous.

Trauma of Abuse

Although I was saved from my sins, my Christian life wasn’t mess free. I was a lamb seeking to follow my Shepherd, but on the pilgrim journey I met some characters disguised as loving spiritual fathers and mentors who were truly wolves in sheep’s clothing. Kindness and sweet tones groomed my vulnerable soul into an object of sinful pleasure and manipulative control, while false theological systems coupled with a lack of accountability provided a breeding ground for this horrific scandal to thrive. For several years I was caught in a guilt-deception trap that I couldn’t free myself from. I had no name for it then, and it was several years later that I came to understand that I was spiritually and sexually abused. During this season of deception, I injured my soul further by sliding into a relational trap with a lesbian whom I was trying to counsel, albeit poorly. Suffice to say, I was a full-blown mess! The Lord saw my struggle and made a way of escape for me through the wisdom and counsel of my husband, who was then my fiance. When I opened up my gangrened soul before him and permitted him to reject me (for what refuse is not rejected), his reply dumbfounded me. “If the Lord has not rejected me, this scumbag of a man, why would I reject you?” O the sweetness of the Gospel dripping into the dying shoot and reviving it! Within a year, we were joyfully married.

Depression and the empty womb

Marriage brought with it many joys but also the sorrow of the empty womb. Following two infant deaths in the womb and subsequent infertility, I had buried the God-given dream of building a home and homeschooling my children. Yet the Lord always provided me a perspective door which has held me in good stead to this day: if I can’t mother children, I will walk alongside other mothers and refresh them! So I began encouraging and helping Indian mothers in their homeschooling journey. It was the year 2016. My husband and I were being trained by some of the best pastors and professors in the world, through RPTS, Pittsburgh, in preparation for pastoral work in India. We returned to India to begin the hard work of shepherding and mentoring people for the long haul. I busied myself with biblical counseling, but within a few months, I spiraled into acute depression owing to a number of factors. I ceased from counseling and holed in, but Christ was yet with me. There is no darkness too dark for Him! (Ps 139:12).

Adoption & Disability

It was at this time that a tiny one entered into our lives. Abhi, as his name went, was a ray of sunshine in my darkness. Abhi was born with third degree spina bifida and related complications that rendered him paraplegic. He had endured endless nights in surgical theaters, all by himself because his parents abandoned him a few days after he was born. Eight years of waiting for mommy and daddy finally ended on his 8th birthday, when we announced teary eyed, that he was finally coming home. Forever. (I’ve chronicled my adoption story on my blog and at other forums ). Adopting Abhi brought me into first hand touch with abandonment trauma, RAD and various other struggles faced by children brought home from hard places. I began training in trauma care for children which enabled me to speak encouragement into the lives of fellow adoptive families who loved their children. It also brought me nearer as an advocate for my son and children like him on disability rights and recognitions. Adopting a child with disability has brought me Coram Deo, to an awe-inspiring God who has the weakest, the most vulnerable, the sickest and the neediest people on top of his mind. “He saves the needy when they call, and saves the poor and those who have no help” goes the song from Psalm 72. It has pulled my heart strings to pay attention to the crying voices of such kindred spirits in my midst, that I might be to them a sort of paracelete, a friend who walks alongside them that they may know that Christ walks alongside them through thick and thin.

My story is still unfolding, and I have so much more to tell. The next season of my life will, God willing, have so many more stories of hope and redemption to tell. It is my prayer that yours would be one of them.