Christians Can Be Depressed Too
Understand the Experience
The first thing I think Christians need to do is to recognize what depression is and what depression is not. First, depression is not simply “feeling sad,” or “feeling emotional.” Certainly, those things will accompany depression, but it is not the entirety of the experience and depressive state. To start, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th edition (DSM-4) states that symptoms of depression are:
Depressed mood most of the day.
Markedly diminished interest or pleasure in all, or almost all, activities most of the day.
Significant weight loss when not dieting or weight gain.
Insomnia or hypersomnia (excessive daytime sleeping) nearly every day.
Feeling physically restless or slowed to an extent that is observable to others.
Fatigue or loss of energy nearly every day.
Feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt.
Diminished ability to think or concentrate.
Recurrent thoughts of death, recurrent suicidal thinking without a specific plan, or an actual suicide attempt.
Currently, the DSM 5 is out and the only difference is that they've removed insomnia and hypersomnia from the list of symptoms, though, to my knowledge there has been no reason given for the removal.
When discussing with someone who is depressed about their experience, the most often used descriptor is "pain." This is often very vague as it could mean physical pain, emotional, or psychological pain, or even a spiritual pain distinct from the psychological. These pains can be further described as fear, hopelessness, terror, silent screams, and emptiness. These feelings often lead to the destruction of various forms up to and including suicide. Think about it just a moment, if a depressed person’s emotional numbness is so excessive, and they already feel as if they are already dead, the natural progression would be to have their physical state catch up to their emotional state, this is why they don't mind moving forward to physical death.
Now, what does this have to do with the Christian, beyond examining what depression is and how to help our neighbor with it. One thing that is often rejected in Christian culture today, especially those of the healing movement persuasion, is that depression and being a Christian cannot co-exist. Many people say that these two cannot be realities within a human being. They would conclude that you are either a Christian or you are without Christ and depressed. Many people do not believe that these cannot go together, and this simply just is not true. You may hear this in various ways such as, “If you are a Christian then you have the power to speak life and death and you shouldn’t ‘speak death’ over your life by accepting that you have depression.” The sad part of this false theology is that people will believe this instead of getting the help they need. What makes it worse is that not only do these people not get the help they need, but the issue is compounded by adding shame and guilt to those who believe they shouldn’t be feeling this way as a Christian.
One misconception is that depressed people can’t be thankful and confident in God. Oftentimes, they are very excited about the things of God because the more they focus on God, the more they can escape the reality they are currently living in. They pray for Christ’s return boldly and powerfully, because they can escape their trials and depressed state. The fact is, some thoughts of death are simply a result of wanting the pain to be over. Death is often taught to us, by the world, that it is the escapist’s resolution, and unfortunately, this is a carryover from the secular worldview even within the Christian's mind. They truly do believe that God will wipe away every tear and they have all hope and confidence in this, and if they die now when they wake up all the pain will be gone.
How to Help Someone Who is Depressed
One thing, living in the West today is that we often want to push what we deem “problems” off to so-called, “experts,” because it is not an area that we have spent copious amounts of hours on. While it is noble to try to get the best help for a person, the best help for them would be the person they have the most access to help them, meaning you. This alone is a “dying to yourself” action because we are not naturally prone to be around someone who is depressed. We often realize that active and constant compassion is exhausting, and it may even pull us down into depression. However, if depression is strong enough to drag others down, imagine how strong of a hold it has on the individual.
Compassion is more than merely sympathizing with a person's pain, but it is not less than that. Compassion can't ignore unbelief or sin either, and too often people think that a depressed person is too fragile to deal with their sin head-on. We say things like, "don't beat a person while they are down!" Or "this will crush their self-worth!" But what it really does is crush their pride, something that they can only look to Christ for personal worth. Of course, knowledge of sin must be accompanied by the knowledge of God's great, forgiving love. But the same is true for a depressed person than it is for every other person, and that is the truth that repentance is the path to liberation, not condemnation.
Practical ways to help: be physically present, pray with them, clean the house with them, read the psalms together, read some of the old hymns from the hymnbook, go for a walk, or exercise together. Sometimes people need to just know about the grace of Christ and the love and forgiveness of God. Other times people need to have their pride crushed because they are depressed because they are "not getting what they want." But to tell the difference starts with listening, and listening starts with being present with your neighbor in the midst of their trial.
To the depressed person, you must ask yourself this, “What if you never get back to 100% emotions of joy, love, even sleep?” Will you still serve God 100% with 60% or 20% of the emotions and sleep you have left?
Finally, a great book that I learned a lot of information from is Ed Welch’s book, Blame It On The Brain? In it, he examines the more common areas of psychological issues that are found today, but does so from a Biblical foundation, utilizing his skill in both counseling (from a Christian worldview) and neurobiology. I would recommend anyone who is dealing with psychological problems or knows someone who has psychological problems to read this book as a starting point and then continue to read. Because what else is counseling than loving your neighbor in practical ways? I got many of my own thoughts from this book, so if I said something that may be directly citing it without properly citing it, that may be the case. So, take this as a blanket citation, just go read the book!
Other Book Recommendations
Depression by Edward Welch
Christians Get Depressed Too by David Murray
Saints, Sufferers, and Sinners by Michael Emlet
