Every day more and more people are being diagnosed as depressed.  Some worse than others, but the feelings are the same: as if we are inadequate, worthlessness, and as if we cannot do anything right along with so many different feelings.  More often than not, the depressive feelings can be more than we can bear, and as if we couldn’t continue living life the same way.  Depression can be one of the hardest things to deal with if we don’t have some sort of faith not simply a Christian faith (though much of this will be using Christian ideals).  Faith can help us make it through the darkest of nights, and we all know night is when the depression is at it’s worst.  Depression can come whenever we least expect it.  We could be at our highest point in life or feel like we couldn’t be happier and then boom depression hits like a juggernaut through a brick wall.

Many different people throughout the Bible dealt with depression, one of the most known examples is the story of Job.  He was stricken with illness, his family was killed and he lost all his money.  He was bound to become depressed, but one of the best things he did was he still praised God’s power and glory while he was asking God why.  You see it is okay for us to ask God why something happens to us, but we also need to keep praising His name and honoring Him.  We can get mad at Him at times, but we are only human.  even though Job was depressed and upset, he still remained blameless and didn’t blame God for his torments.  He dealt with his depression the best way he knew how and one of the ways he did was through his faith and trust in God.  Job tried to be strong, but had the hardest time to remain strong because he felt as if God was punishing him and so often we can feel that same way and depression begins to rear its ugly head.

Psalm 42: 5 and 6 tells us Why am I discouraged? Why so sad? I will put my hope in God!  I will praise him again - my savior and my God now I am deeply discouraged, but I will remember your kindness.  Even when we are faced with depression we need to focus on God and praise his name.  If we don’t the depression will overtake us and Satan will win the battle.  God is our source of happiness and peace.  We should place all hope and trust in His unfailing love when we feel like nothingness.  We need to remember God loves us and no matter how we are feeling H is there to hold us and comfort us.  David wrote that he will put his hope in God even when H felt discouraged and sad.  He stated that he was discouraged yet he would remember God’s kindness and praise him over and over again.  We can wonder why we are discouraged when things seem to be going well in our lives, we can ask why we are dealing with a certain hardship, but one of the main things we need to keep doing just as Job and David did was to continue to praise God.  If we do that, soon the depression will turn away and become happiness.

“Come quickly Lord, and answer me for my depression deepens don’t turn away from me for I will die”  Psalm 143: 7 calls out to God for help as depression deepens.  There will be times throughout the valley of depression when things seem like all that happens is that it gets worse and harder to see happiness through the pain.  When we feel the depression deepening we need to call out, nay cry out to God and cry for His presence and assistance through it all.  We need to be at Hs feet almost as if we are begging Him for His help and that He won’t turn away, even though Hebrews 13:5 tells us that God will never leave us nor forsake us.  We need God at all times of course, but while going through this trial, we really need to depend on Him and rely on His strength to be our strength.  How can we make it through things without relying on God for help and guidance?

God gave us different emotions and ways to express them, depression is just one of those emotions that he gave us that we need.  But we need to know how to deal with them, and one of the best ways to deal with depression, anger, and bitterness is to pray to Him about anything we need to.  Depression is one of the emotions God gave us to help us deal with certain things in our lives, and the thing is sometimes Satan tries to use our God given emotions to tear us away from God, that is why it is so important that we focus our attention to God.  We can do that by reading the Bible, praying, and spending time in fellowship with others.  One thing that we need to remember is that depression may come and go, but God’s love never ever fails or leaves us.  The emotions that we have works differently in different people, some are easily excited, others get angry easily, and for many depression can occur whenever however.  Just one simple work spoken by someone else could spark the light of depression that can cause us so much harm.

You don’t see depression coming up on you because you are so focused on the thing you need to do to meet the needs of the treatments.  It’s like a thief in the night, it slips in unnoticed, and it takes everything in you to battle it.  Depression can easily lead to doubt; doubt in God and doubt in yourself.  During the day we try everything we can to occupy our thoughts so we wouldn’t think of the depressive things, but it’s when the nights come that make things more difficult. Once we turn out those lights that thoughts begin.  Our minds run wild with “what if I don’t get better?” or “what if it comes back: and many other “what if. . .” questions that could be very damaging.  The what if’s thoughts lead to fears about what would happen next.  Because of the fear, doubt, anger depression and discouragement finds it way in and makes itself comfortable within our minds.  I will admit there were moments in my depressive hours that I felt like God wasn’t there hearing my prayers.  But He is; no matter what God is there hearing our prayers and holding us up as the poem “Footprints In The Sand” says.  There will be days when it seems like we cannot go on or don’t have the strength to get up.  It’s those days that we need to lean on God and ask him for strength to carry on.

Depression is something that we can work through.  We can make it through depression, but one thing that we NEED through the fight with it is our faith in God.  We cannot let depression take that away.  When we are feeling worthless we need to call on God and ask Him to show us how worthy we are of his love or rather how important we are to Him.  Now remember that could come in many different ways and sometimes in the smallest of ways.  When we pray for God’s help and guidance we need to keep our eyes and ears open for His voice and His signs.  If we don’t we could miss them.  Depression is hard enough to deal with, it gets harder when we lose faith in Christ.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 21st, 2008 at 4:38 am.