April 20, 2021 (Tuesday)
This is the third of nine blogs on “Personal Problems in Life: Feelings of Anxiety, Loneliness, Depression, Anger, Guilt, Inferiority, Grief, Hostility, and Feelings Associated with Sickness.”
We all have good days and bad days, but when those bad days turn into a long period of being sad, past caring, and unwillingness to get up and go, that’s depression. Depression is different from discouragement, which is temporary and for which there may be reasons, or “the blues,” which may be triggered by some event which soon passes. Clinical depression is a medical condition in which the brain is “doing its own thing.” In the final analysis, chemicals and neurons in the brain do the dirty work, but many times they are triggered by the way we are thinking. It’s a “dog chasing its tail around the post” situation. Or, if you wish, “which came first, the chicken or the egg?” It is a deadly cycle that can be stopped if only the right treatment can be found. But depression is difficult to define, hard to describe and hard to treat.
The Bible does not discuss depression as such but it reflects depression on the part of people, such as King David saying, “Why are you in despair, Oh my soul? And why are you disturbed within me?” There is always a balance in the Scripture like this one, which goes on to say, “Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him.” Psalms of despair, like 69, 88, or 102 are set in a context of hope.
For reasons I can only guess, I was depressed. For years. When Sunday morning rolled around, I felt like I was crawling up out of a deep pit into the pulpit. The worship service was therapeutic, and seemed to help for a few days, but the cycle seemed endless, until, in 1984, at the age of 52, I attended a “Personal and Professional Growth Seminar” at the old Baptist Sunday School Board (now Lifeway Christian Resources) for two weeks, during which three other men and I were led by an employee of the board through a battery of tests and sharing life experiences with each other. Our leader kept telling us, “Trust the process.” When I returned home, I was worse off with frequent weeping spells, but in a few months seemed to rise from the pit into the light. Since then I have never had a prolonged spell of depression. In fact, I can almost say I never am depressed anymore, but I was taught “never say never.”
Because depression is a psychiatric problem, people are reluctant to seek help. It can have a physical or glandular cause, but its symptoms being tied to our emotions, we choose to suffer rather than seek help. I’m not saying it’s a simple matter, but if you suffer from depression, please seek help.
Train yourself to dwell on the positive, as Paul taught in Philippians 4. Negative thinking is our enemy. Not only that, it alienates others, and that’s the last thing we need. I need to think, “God loves me and is at work in my life.” I need to break out of my shell and reach out to help others, and discover the paradox that in helping them I am helped. (But I must maintain my own mental health and not allow my life to be consumed. We need breaks. We need vacations. We need to know there are limits to what we can do for others and renew our own spirits from time to time). I must stop letting negative events shape my thinking and feeling. In the words of a popular song, I need to “shake it off.”
I AM LOVED
Words: Gloria Gaither
Music: Bill Gaither
Date
CHORUS
I am loved, I am loved
I can risk loving you
For the One who knows me best
Loves me most
I am loved you are loved
Won’t you please take my hand
We are free to love each other
We are loved
VERSE 1
I said if You knew You wouldn’t want me
My scars are hidden by the face I wear
He said my child My scars go deeper
It was love for you that put them there
CHORUS
VERSE 2
Forgiven I repeat it I’m forgiven
Clean before my Lord, I freely stand
Forgiven I can dare to love my brother
Forgiven I reach out to take your hand
CHORUS