6 October 2014 by Rev Dr Jai Kumar –
A CRUSHED SPIRIT AND A BROKEN HEART WHO CAN HEAL?
When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. – – Psalm.34:17-18
GOD IS OUR HOPE IN THE MIDST OF DEPRESSION
When you’re depressed, you feel as though you are lost and that nothing in the world can fix your problem to make you feel better. Depression is a devious mood disorder. More often than not it is spiritually induced. It is a condition whereby the symptoms it creates can discourage you tremendously. It is not a disease! But the devil will tell you that you are crippled with a disease.
The devil will tell you there is no hope and there is no way out for you! The devil will tell you are an emotional wreck! You need to rise up and rebuke the voice of the devil. It’s an absolute lie of the devil! There is every hope that God has promised in His word that you can be delivered and healed from this bondage that has afflicted you. Jesus said:
“……the Spirit of the Lord is upon me….to heal the broken-hearted ….. [and] wounded souls.” (Luke 4:18)
SATAN LOVES TO SEE YOU IN THIS WEAKNESS
Satan and his demons want you and me to be crippled and one of his tools is to depress you. He wants you to give it up. So when you are discouraged, Satan will make sure he whisper his evil thoughts and makes his way toward you. We must guard our thoughts, or our minds by the renewing of His word. “Being transformed by the renewing of your mind —Romans 12:2
YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND WHAT DEPRESSION IS ALL ABOUT
When you’re depressed your energy levels can drop drastically, and the next thing you realize is that you are crippled and unable to get up and move on in life. The term for this is simply dysfunctional!
Depression is a condition that can be spiritually induced particularly amongst Christians who are not strongly rooted in God’s word. Guilt from past failures, past mistakes, past hurts and sins that has not been adequately dealt with. Withholding unforgiveness towards others is found to be a major cause. Having wronged and hurt others can bring about this disorder. Undue worry about life and unsure of your salvation and your future destiny in eternity can also contribute to this cause.
THE DEMAND OF RELIGIOSITY
Religious Christians under the blanket of legalism, who laboriously are trying to perform to earn perfection and often feeling guilty that they have failed to reach the mark of God’s standards, can give rise to depression. The fear of death is another common denominator that can sap the joy out of your life.
Unaddressed depression can not only deplete your energy, affects your mental equibrilium, shakes your faith and ultimately also affects everybody around you. Recurrent and repeated episodes of depression can become a mental disorder that may need professional help sometimes.
As life becomes more complex in a modern and advanced society where expectations are high and demanding, people’s inability to cope with the economic and social pressures have been a major contributory factor to the sufferings of depression.
However, it should never be mistaken that depression is a result of a modern day phenomenon. Apparently it is not surprising that it was there since the time God created man.
A COMMON VICTIM OF DEPRESSION: A SOUL THAT IS SCARED
Scars have been created in the life of many people because they have accommodated the opinions of others to judge them. Never allow another person’s opinion of you to control the way you see yourself. Never hand anybody any power to judge you unreasonably. If people don’t have the ability to discern the riches of the treasure that God has deposited inside of you, just tell them it’s too bad!
But if on the other hand it’s because you wilfully allow self-pity and low self image to control you and you keep dwelling in that situation helplessly then I am afraid you got a serious problem to address.
The problem with some of us is that we buy into the enemy’s deception and come to the conclusion that we are not good enough and we are not worthy enough and we don’t like ourselves.
Listen! If your well is dry and empty you got nothing to give anyone anything. You can only give what you have! In Mathew 22: 39, Jesus says we are to love other people to the degree that we love ourselves. If we don’t love ourselves, then we don’t have any love to give to our neighbors.
Here is what we need to understand. People who have been treated hatefully become full of hate and can only give hate. People who have been treated selfishly can only give back selfishness. People who have been criticized become filled with a critical spirit and can only give criticism. People who have been abused become bitter and angry and can only give abuse. “Hurt people will hurt people!”
Refuse to accept or allow other people to squeeze you into their mould. The danger arises when we allow their opinions to creep into our inner soul.
“It matters very little to me what you think of me….the Master makes that judgement.” (1Cor.4:3-4 TM) Insecure people will always criticise you, on the other hand secure people will be able handle you positively. They don’t have to blow your candle in order to light their own.
Note: Rev Dr Jai Kumar is an ordained & licensed minister of Covenant Ministries International N.J. USA. He is also the representative of Faith International Bible School for Malaysia & Singapore. He is the founder and senior pastor of Full Gospel Outreach Ministry KL, a member of ECCM, Spiritual Adviser & overseer of Capstone Ministries/Capstone Community Church -C3 (Bangalore); Co-founder and adviser of Kingdom Christian Fellowship, Subang Jaya, he is also the author of a book entitled, ‘God’s Time Clock.’
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NOTE: In this article, Reverend Jai aims to help Christians overcome depression by understanding its nature and where it is from. In the next article by Reverend Jai, it will be shown how common depression actually is even in the Biblical days and the importance of knowing who we should turn to during times of depression.
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