Getting Honest With God About Depression
We've been in a four-part series on depression and this is number three. So far we have talked about: Where does depression come from? What are some of the symptoms when I have it? What are some of the lies I tell myself? What are some of the bad religious lies that get mixed into this? And what are some of the beautiful things that God says to us in the midst of it?
If you remember, we said that depression is not a character weakness. Depression is not spiritual immaturity. Depression is never a punishment from God. Depression is never a sin that God won't let you find. Depression is never because God doesn't love you enough.
Depression is never because you are not enough.
Today, I want to look at a specific passage of scripture. It identifies how God walks me through seasons of depression. It shows me the incredible honesty that I get to have with God and the incredible beauty of Him working this in me. I look at this passage as though this is what God has done with me. I think it's true for a lot of us.
Psalm 42. It doesn't really say who it's by. So if you don't mind, I want to believe it's David. I break it down into six pieces of what he does. So let me just start out. The first thing he does is he pours out his heart. He pours out everything that he feels. So he says,
“As the deer pants for the water brooks,
So my soul pants for You, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God;
When shall I come and appear before God?
My tears have been my food day and night,
While they say to me all day long, ‘Where is your God?’
These things I remember and I pour out my soul within me.
For I used to go along with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God,
With the voice of joy and thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival.
And then the second thing he does is so interesting and very honest. His hope debates with his sorrow. And he says,
"Why are you in despair, O my soul?
And why have you become disturbed within me?
Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him
For the help of His presence.
Isn't that interesting? He's talking to himself for the help of his countenance. So there's this honest back and forth with himself. Then the third thing he does is remember.
He remembers because he knows God has been faithful.
And so he goes back and recalls those things and says,
“O my God, my soul is in despair within me;
Therefore I remember You from the land of the Jordan
And the peaks of Hermon, from Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep at the sound of Your waterfalls;
All Your breakers and Your waves have rolled over me.
And then after he's done that, he trusts. Now, this is the heart of David. He trusts what he knows only God can do.
“The Lord will command His lovingkindness in the daytime;
And His song will be with me in the night,
A prayer to the God of my life.
He doesn’t know how He's going to do that. He can't pull that off, but he knows that's what He's going to do. He trusts in what only God can do. And then he complained some more. He is not done, but it's so honest. It's so beautiful. Now David is talking to God directly, “God, I'm upset, even though I know you're God and You never make a mistake. I know You haven't forgotten me, but it feels like You've forgotten me.”
“I will say to God my rock, ‘Why have You forgotten me?
Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?’
As a shattering of my bones, my adversaries revile me,
While they say to me all day long, ‘Where is your God?’
And then finally he's being honest. He can see after all this process, after all the honesty, after all the grief, after all of the hope, after all of the battling within himself, he can see a day.
He has this future day where he sees his countenance changing. So beautiful.
And then this.
“Why are you in despair, O my soul?
And why have you become disturbed within me?
Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him,
The help of my countenance and my God.” Psalm 42 (NASB)
This is faith talking to fear and sadness and depression. Hope in God for I shall yet praise Him. I know this is terrible. I hate this. It doesn't make any sense to me, but I know what's coming up. I've been at this long enough. I will praise Him. He is the help of my countenance and my God. I would love you to go through Psalm 42 for yourself. When I first found it, from the earliest time as a believer, I thought somebody finally knows my language. Somebody knows my heart and my soul.
So I hope this is a gift to you as it's been to me all these years of my faith. Thank you.
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