The Story Behind DON’T CHEAT THE BUTTERFLY: A Battle, A Strategy, and A Mind Transformed
Posted on: February 5, 2025
By Kristen Smeltzer
While in your blackest night—your darkest season—it’s difficult to have the eyes to see that God is forging in you something beautiful. He is giving you wings to fly.
Have you ever gone through a season you never thought you’d have to face? Have you questioned God’s reason for allowing it? Wondered why He didn’t appear to be rushing to your rescue? Possibly even found yourself a little offended with Him? I have.
Our family’s darkest season started in 2011. It was the summer before our son, Zachary’s, senior year of high school. Zach was supposed to be spending the night with a friend. Instead, he stood over our bed at 2:00 a.m., trembling. He shook us awake, saying: demons were there; they were going to kill him; and we needed to get up and pray for him. Now!
Before this night, our son was a leader wherever he went. He was level-headed, mature, kind, honoring to us and others, and not prone to fear. He was an A-student and captain of his basketball team. He was not perfect, but he was as near perfect as a son could be.
When Zach shook us awake that dreaded night, it didn’t take long to realize he was high, and we were shocked. We went into the living room and began to pray for him as he grew more and more distraught. After an hour of warring over him in prayer—and nothing changing—I invited Zach to repent to the Lord for whatever door he had opened.
Zach began to confess to God (and to us as his parents) that he had been smoking pot with some friends. After his prayerful confession, he looked up at us, said he “was back” and fell over my husband’s lap and wept.
Zachary rededicated his life to the Lord right then and there. As we all headed off to bed, I remember thinking, “Well, regardless of what has happened, look at the good it has produced! We had a ‘one night blip in the road,’ and now Zach has rededicated his life to the Lord. All is well.” I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Starting the very next day, more began to surface. We learned that, while high, Zach felt he died and experienced a “trip” to hell where he was told he wasn’t “Zach” anymore. He was told we was unredeemable and doomed to hell. And Zach believed it.
From that day forward, Zach began to live in constant terror. It was as if that initial night was stuck on repeat. It felt like demons had taken up residence in our home, and no matter what we did or how we used the spiritual weapons of our warfare, they were allowed to stay.
After days of this, I went before the Lord and asked for a strategy. I knew I needed divine wisdom. The weapons in my spiritual arsenal were not working. My son was disappearing before my eyes. He walked through each day in a terrorized state, like he had been thrust into a horror film. His eyes were blank. He never laughed. He never smiled. He was not only tormented with extreme fear and anxiety by day, but he began having horrific nightmares of a bear tearing his limbs off by night.
Zach also began having vision problems and seeing things. He didn’t want to leave the house out of fear, and my 6’2” former “tough-guy” of a son asked me to sleep with him. He would clutch my hand to his chest as he attempted to sleep. And I would cry out to God in desperation, as I tried to do the same.
I didn’t know what to do. A friend who was a substance counselor felt Zach was experiencing a drug-induced schizophrenia. When I prayed about it, I felt the Lord said this was not mental or chemical, but spiritual. I needed answers, and they wouldn’t come from man. They would come from God, alone.
Something to mask Zach’s symptoms or help him learn to cope was not an option in my book. I desired complete wholeness for my son. In fact, I wasn’t going to settle for anything less. I went before the Lord and asked Him for a divine strategy for healing.
God answered my request. His response seemed simple at the time. Almost too simple. We were to teach Zach, afresh, who God was—His names, His nature, and His character. We were also to remind Zach who he was—Zach’s identity in Christ, and also who he was as a unique individual. (See my book for more detail on this strategy.)
We utilized this strategy, daily. Several times a day, in fact. Whenever Zach would have an intense “episode” of utter terror, he would come to me and grab my hand, unable to speak. And I would implement what the Lord had shown me.
I knew my God, and I knew my authority in Christ. But as the weeks turned to months, it felt like the strategy God gave me wasn’t working. Sadly, the terror Zach was encountering was not his alone. Fear haunted me, as well, as Zach’s mother. I began to struggle with fear of his future. Was this my son’s lot now? Did he have to “learn to survive?” How would he ever be able to leave our home like this and go off to college, have a family of his own, etc.? These thoughts began to plague me and threatened to take me under.
I knew we were under heavy spiritual attack and experiencing intense spiritual warfare. But from my vantage point, the enemy was having a heyday, and God didn’t seem to be doing a thing about it.
It didn’t take long to realize I was offended with God. He wasn’t being the God I knew, and my heart accused Him of not acting according to His own word. (Or so I thought.) In my darkest hour, I failed to remember that God is the God who keeps His Word and promises…AND things are not always as they appear.
It appeared that Zach and I (as his mom) were stuck in a black cocoon with no way of escape. We couldn’t tell which side was up, which side was down. There was no door of escape. No sliver of light. I did everything in my power to break Zachary (and myself) free of its dark confines, but to no avail.
What I didn’t understand at the time was that God was doing something in the waiting. He was creating something beautiful in the darkness. He was producing something of eternal value in our struggle to break free of the cocoon. He was transforming us. And He was giving us wings to fly.
It took over a year, but my son walked out of this season completely whole. There is not a remnant of this season left behind. God completely healed him, and there is no sign that he ever suffered extreme anxiety or mental distress.
One fruit of this season was a book. I felt strongly that God asked me to write our story and the spiritual lessons God taught me along the way. It took me years to obey this call. First, I didn’t want to relive it, even on paper.
After running from this calling for years, God spoke to me in a profound way. In a nutshell, He asked me if I would write our story to help others who were going through various, intense trials. I finally gave Him my “yes.” (The 1st Edition, WHO DO YOU SAY I AM, came out in 2017 and has been blessed to have sold over 12,000 copies.)
The 2nd Edition, DON’T CHEAT THE BUTTERFLY, is available as of February 2025. Our story is encapsulated in its pages, and Zach even wrote the Afterword. (Zach was also filmed giving his testimony to air on GodTV!)
The strategy and lessons presented in this book are NOT simply for fear, anxiety or mental illness. They are for MANY trials and spiritual battles we face, especially in regard to how it affects identity, (God’s true identity and our identity in Christ.)
One major lesson I learned through all this is that: if you have places in your heart where you doubt the true identity and nature of God (mainly His goodness and power made manifest on your behalf and in your circumstances), you will doubt the truth of who God created you to be, as a result. And this can keep you from walking into the fulness of your destiny.
The book includes steps to help you walk through your dark seasons, pain, offenses with God, hopeless places, etc. You will find “How-Tos” at the end of each chapter that are great for personal or group study. It even includes a devotional, prayer guides, journaling prompts, and the Scripture lists I used to teach Zach who God is, and the truth of who he was in Christ (to counteract the enemy’s lies during his season of torment.)
I pray my book, DON’T CHEAT THE BUTTERFLY: A Battle, A Strategy, and A Mind Transformed, is a beautiful resource for you. May you find hope for YOUR STORY, no matter your unique circumstances. God desires you to walk through any offenses you have with Him for what He has seemingly allowed in your life, and to also discover His goodness and power—made manifest for you.
May God heal, restore, and bless you richly. And may our testimony be the launching pad for yours!
Many blessings,
Kristen Smeltzer
