Depression: Looking Up from the Stubborn Darkness (21 page)

As God’s offspring, we desire life. God is the author of life; he says that life is a good thing, and we tacitly agree. You, too, naturally desired life. There was a time when death, at least as an option, was never a thought. It didn’t cross your mind. But then there it was.

When it first came, even you were surprised. The thought was so foreign that it seemed to be implanted by someone else. You felt like an observer as it whizzed by. Over time, these shocking thoughts became more common. For some, they remain a terrible nuisance. For others, these thoughts eventually felt comfortable, to the point of feeling natural, good, and right.

If you are depressed, you have a rocky relationship with death. You want it but you fear it. Thankfully, fear and other circumstances keep many people from acting on their impulses, but fear is not a lasting deterrent. A moment’s desperation could overrule it. Please take time to think more deeply about your hopelessness.

There is
some
truth in suicidal thinking. When life is examined apart from God, thoughts of death make perfect sense. The writer of Ecclesiastes saw this; so did Nietzsche when he said that, for all practical purposes, God is dead. When God is dead, there is no purpose, no future. We are dead too.

But suicidal thinking only sees part of the picture. In fact, it
insists
on only seeing part of the picture—the part that will confirm its interpretation of reality. If you have thoughts about suicide, its logic is clear and simple, but it is irrational.

You are certain of a catastrophic future. But you have always predicted catastrophes, and you have been a woefully inaccurate prophet.

You think that death is the only option, but you forget that there are times when your pain is less severe. And you have forgotten that you have done a number of things that have made your pain more tolerable.

You think that no one would care if you took your own life, but you are blind to the people who have tried to help, and you know that every suicide leaves a wake of mourners whose lives are forever changed.

You think that God doesn’t hear or care, but you also believe that his heaven is a pain-free paradise.

You think that you must solve impossible problems, but God calls you to tasks that are smaller and more ordinary. He calls you to look around and be faithful with what is directly in front of you.

You are preoccupied with death. Given that God is life, that fact alone should give you doubts about your reasoning. You might even derive a perverse satisfaction from considering the means of suicide. But having tasted something of hell, you are fearful of death. You are concerned that death would give you the “full blast.”
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“Dread” captures your experience. Like a child watching a scary movie, you shield your eyes but peek through your fingers.

Dread is a desire for what one fears, a sympathetic antipathy; dread is an alien power which takes hold of an individual, and yet one cannot extricate oneself from it, does not wish to ... but what one fears attracts one.
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The paradoxes continue. You feel more desperate than anyone alive. You feel helpless before the sinkhole of pain. You feel absolutely powerless. But meditations on suicide are the ultimate expression of human autonomy and control. Against all counsel, you persist in thinking about death and suicide. You choose individualism. Self-law. You do what you want. It sounds like a declaration of independence, and it sounds angry.

All you know, however, is that your pain is intolerable. You can’t take it anymore, and there is no relief in sight. That is enough. Other facts are irrelevant.

When you are depressed, you rarely challenge your own thinking. When your depression includes suicidal thoughts, you challenge them even less. Yet this is too important to leave unexamined.

You think about death because you can’t take the pain anymore. Have you considered where the pain is coming from? It rarely comes from nowhere.

Is the pain always this intense or does it fluctuate? What intensifies it? What decreases it? When you are in the most extreme pain, you forget that it doesn’t stay at that pitch.

What have you lost that is so precious to you? What do you believe you need that you don’t have? You will discover where you have placed your trust with these questions.

What are you afraid to face? Shame has led many people to despair, but God’s forgiveness covers both guilt and shame.

Does your pain have anything to do with another person? If so, Scripture is full of hope for asking forgiveness, forgiving, and reconciling.

What do you expect death to do? You want it to take away the pain, but what else? Would it also be a statement to anyone?

Why do you feel powerless? Have you listened to the counsel of others? What have they said? What have you done?

Why, really, don’t you want to live?

The connection between our distress and our relationship with God is not always obvious, but the topic of suicidal thoughts makes the connection unavoidable. Suffering always raises theological questions, but death and suicide compel them. Death is the one place where religion still reigns over all discussions. And, most importantly, death means that you will meet God.

Who is God?

Do you believe he hears? Do you believe that he is the God of great compassion? Do you believe that his compassion is active—that he is doing something now? Do you believe he gives grace to persevere in trials? Do you believe that he knows the details of your pain and gives you enough grace every day? What difference would it make if you did believe these truths?

Do you know that the risen Jesus is “sustaining all things by his powerful word” (Heb. 1:3)?

Have you really tried to know the mind of God regarding your present situation? Who have you spoken with? Has anyone suggested that suicide is a wise choice? What Scripture have you read? How have you prayed?

Do you understand the gospel? The gospel is about the resurrection, and the resurrection is the ground for hope.

If you think suicide is a good or viable option, you don’t know God. You think he is silent, but he is not. He is generous in the way
he reveals himself, and he speaks clearly. He speaks of his patience and love for you. He calls you to trust him and to let that trust express itself in love toward others. He says he gives you grace to persevere and teaches you how to persevere. Maybe you are listening for something other than what he is saying.

Read the end of Job again (Job 38–42). Job was tortured with physical and psychological pain. He wrestled with issues of life and death more extensively than any human in Scripture. Throughout it all, he persevered in faith but felt like he needed more from God. He wanted to understand more of his ways.

God’s response was to emphatically state that he was God. His questions to Job began like this:

“Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me.

Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand.

Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone—while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?

Who shut up the sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb, when I made the clouds its garment and wrapped it in thick darkness, when I fixed limits for it and set its doors and bars in place, when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther; here is where your proud waves halt’?” (Job 38:3–11)

Be sure to read all of God’s questions. They will allow you to see a much bigger story. They will, at least, take your eyes away from the immensity of your pain and point you to the object of hope.

If you are looking for answers, Job is one of many places you can turn. Another is to God’s promises.

No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it. (1 Cor. 10:13)

This is one of the better-known promises, and it is one where God appears to have reneged because severe depression feels like more than you can bear. Therefore, it is important to consider for two reasons. First, it is a great promise. Second, if you are starting to believe that it isn’t always true, then you may start asking where else God’s promises might have exceptions. Such doubts erode faith.

When you read the larger passage, it recounts Israel’s exodus from Egypt and the Israelites’ struggles in the desert. When difficulties came, many of the people quickly abandoned God and either grumbled against him or turned to idols. This passage is saying that you, too, will go through a desert, and when you do, the Spirit will strengthen you in such a way that you can avoid grumbling and idolatry. God’s promise is that he will never put us in a situation where we have no choice but to sin. He either will relieve the intensity of the temptation, or he will give us grace to trust and obey in the hardship. This promise means that depression cannot coerce you to sin.

The shrug and indifference that this so often elicits reveals the irrationality within us all. From our perspective, there is only one thing that God could say that would cause us to listen: we want him to take away the pain. From God’s perspective, however, the most important thing he could give us is the power to trust and obey when we feel powerless. In the mind of God, sin is a much more serious problem than suffering. In ours, the order is reversed.

Here is a place to start. Consider that your present hopelessness is sin. Either you have put your trust in something other than Christ, which is sin, or, like the Israelites in the desert, you have essentially said that what God says is not true, which is the sin of unbelief.

God not only forgives these sins against him, he empowers you to put your hope in him. In your despair, can you ask God to give you grace to resist sin and trust him through suffering?

Job opens our eyes to see God’s greatness. The promise from 1 Corinthians 10:13 opens our eyes to the fact that our sin is more serious than our suffering. Many other passages open our eyes to the God who comforts his people. The Lord is the good shepherd whose presence comforts the sheep. He is the one who calls out, “Comfort, comfort my people” (Isa. 40:1), and the one who is called “the God of all comfort” (2 Cor. 1:3).

Where is this comfort? Ask for it. Ask to have eyes open to seeing it. Look for it. Ask others to point the way. The comfort you are looking for is available, and it can be found in Jesus Christ.

Question 1.
What is your only comfort in life and in death?
Answer:
That I belong—body and soul, in life and in death—not to myself but to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ, who at the cost of his own blood has fully paid for all my sins and has completely freed me from the dominion of the devil; that he protects me so well that without the will of my Father in heaven not a hair can fall from my head; indeed, that everything must fit his purpose for my salvation. Therefore, by his Holy Spirit, he also assures me of eternal life, and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live unto him.
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This comfort comes in two parts: in the knowledge of Jesus, and in the fact that we belong to him through faith.

You don’t belong to yourself. That certainly adds purpose, hope, and comfort to life. “You were bought at a price” (1 Cor. 6:20), “not with perishable things such as silver or gold ... but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Pet. 1:18–19). “You are of Christ, and Christ is of God” (1 Cor. 3:23).

If you are self-employed and you don’t care whether your business succeeds or fails, there is no reason to work. Occasionally, you might get out of bed and go through the motions for the sake of loved ones, but your heart wouldn’t be in it. But if you were an ambassador, called by the king—a royal emissary—you wouldn’t think about whether or not to get up. You simply get up. You are on a mission.

God, you say, can easily get a replacement. You won’t be missed. There are, after all, thousands from which to choose. Be careful on this one. Be suspicious. Lies can mingle with the truth. Of course, God has called many people to himself, and he will accomplish his purposes. The reality, however, is that he chooses people, especially weak people, to accomplish them. He chooses individual people and has established our tasks from before the foundation of the world (Eph. 2:10). The comfort is that
you
belong to him.

Can you pray that you would share this song of praise with the apostle Paul?

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. (2 Cor. 1:3–4)

Why do you think about death? What does God say to you when you find hope in suicidal thoughts?

Sarah was a dinosaur in the world of depression. She was both very depressed and not taking antidepressant medication. Part of her rationale was that, like many people, she didn’t like taking aspirin let alone something more potent unless it was absolutely necessary. The other reason was that she felt that she should be able to shake free of depression, or at least the inactivity in her life, by relying on Jesus alone.