Introduction
- Christians And Compassion
- God And Our Emotional Healing
- God Is Kind, Gentle And Sensitive
- God Cares About Our Pain
- God Is Always Listening
- God Values Us Highly
- God Has Promised That Things Will Get Better
- Introduction
- Suffering
- Be Honest
- Self Pity
- Anger And Forgiveness
- Fear And Worry
- Guilt
- What We Think About
- Being Thankful
- Praise And Worship
- Our Personal Relationship With God
Further Reading
Introduction
Note: this is written for Christians, but anyone is welcome to read it, of course.
This page is about us and God, not about psychiatrists, therapy and/or medications. I’m not commenting here on whether they do or don’t work; my purpose is to encourage Christians to seek God in the midst of depression and other pain, whatever else they are doing to deal with the pain.
Christians And Compassion
I am concerned by the lack of compassion shown by many “Christians” towards those in pain. Such Christians fail to understand the depth and reality of emotional pain and what it does to people. They quote Bible verses, thinking that they are showing “love”; whereas true love is shown by taking the time to listen to someone in pain and cry with them, comfort them and pray with them and for them. It’s better not to say anything than to say something which sounds like you are minimizing a person’s pain.
Christians ought to be as sensitive as Jesus. These words written by Isaiah describe how gently Jesus treats those of us who could be described as a “bruised reed” or a “smoldering wick”:
A bruised reed he will not break, and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out. (Isaiah 42:3, also quoted in Matthew 12:20)
God And Our Emotional Healing
Having said that, I do believe that the Bible has much comfort and hope to offer those in pain. But a “band-aid” approach of trying to cover up our pain with Scriptures will not work. We need to ask God to show us the truth that will set us free. We need Him to reveal to us our misconceptions about Him which keep us from fully trusting Him and letting Him have control of every area of our lives. We need to learn how to depend on His strength and not our own. We need to believe what He has promised and learn to walk in faith, based on those promises. God is not primarily concerned with our outward behavior (although He does care very much about how we treat other people). He wants to deal with our hearts, to change us within. No matter how secure our defenses against other people may be, God is already inside those walls which we have built to keep other people from seeing who we really are. So we may as well accept that He knows all our sins and weaknesses already and loves us anyway, and has called us into relationship with Him despite all of those things. It is very comforting, once we get used to it, that we can never surprise God by the extent of our sin or failure, since He already knows and accepted us and loves us anyway.
I divided my thoughts into a section about God and a section about what our response ought to be, given our relationship to Him (to get to these sections, click on one of the next two titles).
About God
How Shall We Live?
Further Reading
“The Inner Voice Of Love” by Henri Nouwen has been helpful to me; it is his notes written to himself as he was recovering from an emotional breakdown. In it he writes about how God’s love sets us free to love others in an appropriate way. I like everything I have read by Henri Nouwen, yet this book has been especially meaningful to me. I also like Larry Crabb’s books. In “Inside Out” he talks about the need for us to be honest about the pain and suffering we do encounter in this world, and that we must let it drive us to God instead of looking for comfort from the world or by denying the pain. I also like “Connecting” very much, which explains that we can help each other to heal and grow in Christ by connecting with one another and allowing God’s Spirit to minister through us to others.
I have listened to many of the call-in shows of the people who run the New Life Clinics (their URL is http://www.newlife.com/) and read some of their books. I find their advice very helpful, especially their comments about the need for Christians to have healthy relationships with other Christians and to go through a sort of “grieving” process over all the major disappointments in our lives such as being let down by people who have significant roles in our lives and when our dreams that don’t come true. The names of these authors are Henry Cloud, John Townsend, Steven Arterburn and Paul Meier.
I have heard good things about “When God Doesn’t Make Sense” by James Dobson and “Where Is God When It Hurts” by Philip Yancey. I have read other books by them and appreciated them but not those specific books.
If you want to read something funny which will take your mind off the pain for a little while, my favorite humorous Christian book (and in my view there are too few humorous Christian books around, making this even more special) is “The Sacred Diary Of Adrian Plass aged 37 ¾” by Adrian Plass. This is a British book; it is supposed to be in print in the US by Zondervan, or you could order it online from a British bookstore such as Blackwell’s. (Make sure you get the original; there is also a sequel with the same title except he is now aged 45 ½ – that is good too but read the original first!)
Much of what I have learned about practical ways to deal with situations in daily life in a Christlike way comes from Mary Whelchel, who has a ministry named The Christian Working Woman (the URL is http://www.christianworkingwoman.org/).