Christian Life

We continue our series looking at those experiences that can lead us to feel that nobody actually cares about us.  Over a number of weeks, I have attempted to focus on pastoral issues and relate them to scripture as a means of explaining a particular challenge that needs to be faced through the grace of God.

We feel no-one cares particularly when we are dealing with depression.  Here in Australia, depression is recognised as a major health challenge.  We are told that by 2020 it will be second only to heart disease as the leading cause of death and disability.  Although the problem blights many lives, there are strategies to help – and we at Wesley Mission care for many people in this way.  We recognise the importance of organisations like Beyond Blue and many others helping people at their time of need.  In fact here at Wesley Mission we are partnering with others, including Beyond Blue, in researching into the theme of depression amongst older people.  This is an area that has been little considered … and too often depression in older people is unhelpfully defined in other terms.

Psalm 42 is probably linked to the psalm which follows and some have argued that the two were originally one.  Indeed several existing manuscripts combine them and Psalm 43 is the only psalm without a title in Book II – The Psalms of the Temple (42-72).  This strengthens the argument.  Listen to how the writer concludes Psalm 42:  “Why are you downcast, O my soul?  Why so disturbed within me?  Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.”  (Psalm 42:11)

The psalmist looks at his own life and recognises he is full of despondency.  It is most interesting that this same psalm begins with the beautiful comparison of the soul’s thirst for God with that of a young deer in a desert drought, panting for water.  So it is that the experience of depression can lead us to desire something more, which can feel completely inaccessible to us.

Norman Snaith, in Hymns of the Temple, makes some helpful comments:  “The psalmist is speaking of the anxious craving for fellowship with God of the man who once has known that fellowship.  Here his craving is directly associated with the worship of God in His sanctuary.  Those people, then or now, who are lackadaisical about attendance at church have never known what it really means to worship God.  The man who knows in his own personal experience something of the joy of fellowship with God is not lackadaisical about any opportunity of renewing that fellowship, whether it be in private devotions or in public worship.  In the last resort no enticement to be present in church is of avail other than that soul hunger which can be fed only with the Bread of Heaven.  Such a man cannot keep away.  His own soul hunger will drive him thither.”

The Bible is never afraid of the truth – and the story of Elijah the Prophet in 1 Kings 19: 1-9 is striking.  Elijah had been successful, but he received a message from Jezebel through a messenger which warned him his life was in danger.  He was afraid and ran for his life.  He eventually came to Beersheba in Judah and went a day’s journey into the desert.  We read that “He came to a broom tree and sat down under it that he might die.  ‘I’ve had enough, Lord!’” (1 Kings 19:4)  There is much more to the story, but it shows the real experience that Elijah went through.

Elijah’s complaint was that he felt no better than his ancestors and he felt useless.  We sometimes expect too much of ourselves!

When depression hits our lives, it can leave us without hope.  Patrick Elverton in “Taming the Black Dog” wrote, “Depression diminishes light and neutralises the colours around us.  It inhibits love, spoils enjoyment, denies humour, magnifies legitimate worries and results in a sense of purposelessness.” 

Elverton chose his title from what Winston Churchill called his depression, namely ‘the black dog’.  It was in the darkest days of the Civil War that Abraham Lincoln wrote, “I am now the most miserable man living.”  Fortunately, for most sufferers, it is not continuous and it comes in bouts.  Depression is a common experience but it is debilitating and can result in the most serious of illnesses.  It robs folks of their capacity to enjoy the basic pleasures of life and has a marked impact upon the ability of a person to think and act.

Jack Dominion is a Roman Catholic layman with a long, distinguished medical career as a top psychologist.  In recent years much of his study has been in the area of marriage and family, but I still find his book simply entitled Depression to be most helpful.  He wrote it to guide Samaritans in dealing with the challenge the condition presents.  He helps to define depression and points to ways in which we can be helpful to those who have to face the difficulties.

In his introduction, he defines depression as first and foremost a mood:  “This may vary from feelings of slight sadness to utter misery and dejection.”

The greatest difficulty that many people face in handling depression is the unwillingness to seek help, often because depression is placed in a specific area of people’s understanding of illness and to ask for support can feel like an acknowledgement of failure on their part.

Some practical help from scripture can make a difference.  David was the great singer of Israel, yet he had periods of deep depression.  He had reasons for feeling bad about himself, but he also had struggles over many doubts and fears.  Yet, with the grace of God, he climbed out of despair and depression and pulled himself up with the power of God on three rungs that are important for all of us.

I use the picture of a ladder not in any way to emphasise that it is by our own effort that we can climb out of depression, but to indicate that there are steps on that pathway.

The rung of self-examination and self-understanding 

The psalm encourages us to examine ourselves and to make a frank self-appraisal.  This can work wonders for us.  Sometimes the reason we feel like we do is because of things that have happen to us and we need to be sure we do not damage ourselves.  When we observe Jesus in the gospels, we see that he nurtured a relationship with his heavenly Father.  This did not prevent him from feeling the pain of Gethsemane, but it did help him to face life’s challenges. 

As we examine ourselves, we begin to open ourselves up, allowing God to deal with us as we are.  Some degree of self-understanding is vital in being able to get our foot on the first rung of climbing out of depression.  I would consider four aspects of self-understanding:

• This experience of sustained gloom is not uncommon.
  
• The physical exhaustion and abolition of enjoyment are often peers together.
  
• Infrequent sleeping habits and irritability are obvious expressions of what is happening.
  
• Negative thoughts about ourselves seem to crowd into every corner of our lives.

I recall reading one person’s feelings about this:  “It’s foggy, there’s a traffic jam, the trains has been cancelled, I’ve got the toothache, that’s typical of what happens to me all the time.”

Verse 3 in the psalm even hints at disturbed eating habits:  “My tears have been my food day and night.”  His life was so drawn into his feelings of depression that he could not maintain proper eating habits.  Eating consistently is so important to maintaining good health.

Depression is far more than merely sadness.  Dominion explains the experience of depression, when he says it is “complete loss of interest in former interests and pleasures … which means a kind of restless, frustrated boredom.  Nothing seems worthwhile anymore, especially eating.  Shopping and cooking become huge tasks beset with insurmountable problems.  Trivial decisions have to be made and you can’t make one, and hours go by and panic sets in because you can’t think and can’t do anything.”

John White, the Christian psychiatrist, suggests that depression can begin very early in life and even in childhood, though very often it is simply dismissed as being a child with surliness, tearfulness, poor sleeping habits, and so on.  It’s interesting that many have declined to consider illness in children/young people and older people as being related to depression.

Campbell Morgan writes of Psalm 42, “This is the song of an exile and, moreover, of an exile among enemies who have no sympathy for his religious convictions.  He cries out after God with all the intensity of one who knows God and cares supremely for the honour of God’s name.  His greatest grief is their mocking inquiry after his God.  By contrast he remembers being in the midst of worshipping multitudes, their leader and companion.”

As the psalmist looks back, he remembers how things were and this helps him to consider afresh his present predicament.  You can well understand how alone he feels, except for his crying out to God.  At least recognising that we are not alone in our experience can be helpful in getting our foot on the ladder to recovery.  Figures suggest that between a third and a half of people may be afflicted by the experience of depression.  This at least helps us to know that ours is not an isolated experience.  

The rung of memory 

The second rung is the rung of memory and how important this is in life, as we look back on our past.  Deterioration of memory is one of life’s most painful experiences.  Memory is an essential part of our holding life together and affirming the continuous meaning of life.

There is a strong body of evidence which suggests that people experience depression at certain times of the year … hence we have what is described as ‘Seasonal Affected Disorder’ or SAD.   

We read that the psalmist remembered the past – and there are times when we need to turn our minds to the choice experiences of the past.  The psalmist talks about those great experiences: “These things I remember as I pour out my soul:  how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng.” (Psalm 42:4)

No-one is completely devoid of having memories to draw on.  Dealt with in a proper way, these can be an inspiration and a power for the present.  To take charge of our future, we need to be able to handle our past.  How many of us knew what it was as teenagers to play ping-pong.  Too many people live life as though they were in a game of table tennis.  We need to take back control of our lives through the power of Jesus Christ and not just be batted back and forth like the little white plastic ball.

There has been some consideration as to whether the Apostle Paul experienced depression, as he describes his experience of dilemma in Romans 7.  There seems to be a profound experience as he writes, “What a wretched man I am!  Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24)  Frank Stagg writes in his commentary, “SOS!  Paul sends out the distress signal.  More, he cries out for someone to rescue him.  Rescue from what?  From sin?  Even more, it is rescue from himself that is called for.”

This experience is not unknown.  Many people have come to a place where they have felt self-ruin.  Perhaps this helps us to understand what the spiritual writer called “The Dark Night of the Soul.”

This phrase emerged from the writings of a Spanish Carmelite priest in the sixteenth century.  It became an expression which describes a specific phase in a person’s spiritual life and a metaphor for loneliness and desolation.  In our Protestant tradition, we have avoided talking about such an experience and have even made those who talk in these terms to feel guilty.  Have we, in doing this, driven people away from the Christian faith – or at least forced them to suffer unnecessarily?

There are some forms of Christianity that are so up-beat about victorious living, positive thinking and spiritual ‘highs’ that folks who are walking a different pathway (which may include despair, sadness or depression) will never feel welcome.

It is amazing just how many people who are highly creative may experience depression.  Florence Nightingale, the Lady of the Lamp, was a pioneer of modern nursing, a writer, a statistician and a leading exponent of hygiene and sanitation, yet she experienced deep depression.

Four years prior to Florence Nightingale going to Crimea she wrote in her diary, “O weary days.  O evenings that never end!  For how many long years I have watched the drawing-room clock and thought it would never reach the ten! … In my thirty-first year I see nothing desirable but death.”

We must, however, remind ourselves that St Paul had an answer when he asked who would rescue him:  “Thanks be to God – through Jesus Christ our Lord!”  (Romans 7:25)

A depressed person is fatigued beyond ordinary weakness.  There can be an impenetrable darkness in the mind and a sense of guilt that defies absolution.  The psalmist looks back and thanks God for those memories that can refresh life and lift the heavy burdens.  I used to have a member of my congregation who took an interest in my health and, if ever I was laid low with the latest flu virus, which thankfully wasn’t very often, they would turn up with a brown paper bag containing what they called ‘a bottle of tonic’.  I have to tell you it tasted awful!  The real tonic of our lives is to recognise God on the journey with us.

One feature of depression that is hard to handle is the loss of self-esteem.  John White writes, “In simple terms we lose self-esteem when we fail to meet our own view of what is good and right.  We are discouraged on perceiving the appalling gap between what we want to be and who we are, between our goals and our ability to perform.  Christians will readily understand the dilemma.”  Perhaps it is at this point that we understand the experience of the Apostle. 

When we reach a time when we feel there is no hope and our esteem is bruised beyond all recognition, we remind ourselves of the love that God has shown in Jesus Christ.

The rung of God's presence 

As you journey through the psalm you come to a point where the writer says, “I will say to God my Rock, ‘Why have you forgotten me?  Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?’” (Psalm 42:9)

Our Christian faith has a great deal to say to us here.  God understands our every need, enters into our every pain and is sympathetic to our every aspiration.  Whilst he rejoices in our every success, he also feels for our every failure.  He loved us in the beginning, he loves us now and he’ll love us to the end. 

Paul offered a triad of those things that will outlast time – namely faith, hope and love.  It is the central of the three that is so important through depression.  We need to talk more readily about hope and see its importance in Christian living as being far more meaningful than just looking beyond this world.  Hope is the equivalent of faith, but clearly looking forward.

Simone Weil, the twentieth century French philosopher and Christian writer, talked of hope in these terms:  “The virtue of hope is an orientation of the soul towards transformation after which it will be wholly and exclusively love.”  She lived a very short life (only thirty-four years) and wrote some of the most powerful material, linking spirituality and political activism.

When we are dealing with depression, it takes time to be able to handle it.  It doesn’t happen overnight.  We have a plant on our deck which suffers if there is no rain whilst we are on holiday.  When we return it looks wilted and lifeless.  However, once we start to give it what it needs, it comes to life and it becomes green and healthy again.  It takes some time for this to happen, but it does revive in the end … but you can’t leave it too long!

When we walk with Jesus Christ, he does not condemn us when we experience depression; he does not judge us, but provides a way in which we can be empowered and given life.  Each rung of the ladder matters:  looking back and examining ourselves; dealing with the memories that so easily pull us back; and, most important of all, rediscovering our communion with God.

In the closing moments of this address, I refer you once again to one of my favourite theological books – and that is the Peanuts comic strip!  Linus and Charlie Brown are leaning on a fence talking.  Linus says, “I guess it’s wrong to be worrying about tomorrow, maybe we should think only about today.”  Charlie Brown interrupts him to say, “No, that’s giving up.  I’m still hoping that yesterday will get better!”

A lot of people have no hope for today and are sure tomorrow will be just as hopeless.  David A Redding tells of an old Presbyterian elder who, at the age of 103, took out a three-year subscription to a magazine – and he received every copy!  When you are climbing up from depression this is the kind of confidence you need.

The final rung on this ladder to safety is the assurance that God is with us – and we can be assured of his presence.

Joseph Bayley in Psalms of my Life wrote ‘A Psalm in a Hotel Room’:

I’m alone Lord
alone
a thousand miles from home.
There’s no one here who knows my name
except the clerk
and he spelled it wrong
no one to eat dinner with
laugh at my jokes
listen to my gripes
be happy with me about what happened today
and say that’s great.
No one cares.
There’s just this lousy bed
and slush in the street outside
between the buildings.
I feel sorry for myself
and I’ve plenty of reason
to.  Maybe I ought to say
I’m on top of it
praise the Lord
things are great
but they’re not.
Tonight
it’s all
gray slush.

It was the companionship of Jesus on the Emmaus Road that led the two disciples to conclude “Were not our hearts burning within while he talked with us on the road and opened the scriptures to us?” (Luke 24:32). 

Thank God for his living and transforming presence!