E2 - Heaven Land Devotions - Joanie & Brook Fellowship - The Depression of The Saints

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**Notes today were taken from: https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2021/february-web-only/diana-gruver-companions-darkness-spurgeon-depression.html

Today Brook and I discuss the subject of depression. If you have ever been depressed then you know first hand how horrible it is. We both endured it. It is lonely, tormenting, sorrowful and dark. There are many forms and kinds of depression. Most of them have to do with loss, and those losses take on the form of endless things and circumstances. There is also clinical depression.

There is yet another kind. The kind that comes without cause. For Charles Spurgeon, the celebrated 19th-century preacher, depression was more than just circumstantial. When he spoke of it in his sermons and lectures, his examples, which were often rooted in his own experience, included a significant form of depression: the kind that comes without cause.

In one sermon, he said, "You may be surrounded with all the comforts of life and yet be in wretchedness more gloomy than death if the spirits are depressed. You may have no outward cause whatever for sorrow and yet if the mind is dejected, the brightest sunshine will not relieve your gloom. There are times when all our evidences get clouded and all our joys are fled. Though we may still cling to the Cross, yet it is with a desperate grasp."

Some people expected there to be a quick fix, a logical solution, or some sort of spiritual willpower that could defeat it, but light and joy were evasive. Spurgeon clearly knew this helplessness and how poorly people can react to it.

He spoke directly to harsh and insensitive “helpers” from the pulpit—those who were quick to cast blame, quick to tell depressed people to just pull themselves out of it, and slow to show compassion. He also would not tolerate the accusation that “good Christians” do not get depressed.

“God’s people,” he preached, “sometimes walk in darkness, and see no light. There are times when the best and brightest of saints have no joy.” See Isaiah 50:10. He was clear that depression isn’t a guaranteed sign of whether or not someone is a Christian; nor is it a sign you aren’t growing in your faith. It is possible to be faithful and depressed: “Depression of spirit is no index of declining Grace—the very loss of joy and the absence of assurance may be accompanied by the greatest advancement in the spiritual life.”

"I find myself frequently depressed - perhaps more so than any other person here. And I find no better cure for that depression than to trust in the Lord with all my heart, and seek to realize afresh the power of the peace-speaking blood of Jesus, and His infinite love in dying upon the cross to put away all my transgressions." ~Charles Spurgeon