Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 163 | Depression & Suicide

Episode Date: September 16, 2019

Depression and suicide have a profound impact in our society and in the church. Today, we take a look at what scripture has to say about them.   Genesis 950: Receive a free spray bottle and discount using promo code: BLAZE  | GENESIS950.com

Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort.

We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch the Steve Day Show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us. Hey, guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity and reality itself. on the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality.

We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this Steve Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us. So there is really no graceful way to shift gears here, but I'm going to try my best. Let us get into the topic at hand today. Last week on Instagram, I asked to you guys what you would like me to talk about on this theology Monday. And the vast majority of you, like a crazy number of you, asked that I talk about depression and suicide. It came along with the question, do Christians who commit suicide still go to have? heaven. We are going to discuss how to view depression from a biblical perspective that's going to be

tied in with encouragement for those of you who might be experiencing that or suffering from that right now. The reason why I think many of you asked me this is because of something tragic that happened last week. There is a pastor out of California. There was a pastor out of California named Jared Wilson. He committed suicide. He left behind two little boys and his wife. He had been openly struggling. with depression for a while and he actually worked to help other people who were having suicidal thoughts or who were kind of stuck in a rut of a depressive state. I did not know him at all. The only connection that I have to him is that he followed me on Twitter. I know of a lot of the people that he knew. That was the only reason I knew his name. And after seeing the number of

lives that he touched that have spoken out about the impact that he had on them, after looking at pictures of his beautiful family, it just kind of broke my heart. Of course, any suicide, no matter who it is, is absolutely heartbreaking, but just seeing the influence and the profound impact that he had on so many people in the name of Christ to see someone like that take his own life. There's just another layer, at least for me, of sadness that I feel. I think the feeling that some people with depression may have seen an incident like this with Jared Wilson is, well, if a pastor, if a godly pastor could not withstand his depression, if someone so close to God who supposedly prayed knew God's word, supposedly just because we don't

know him personally, knew God's word, had accountability and community and family and purpose, someone who knew the truth and was sensitive to the Holy Spirit, if that person committed suicide, then is there any hope for me? Am I going to be able to withstand my? my depression, am I going to be able to persevere? Am I going to be able to get through this? Maybe you're someone saying, my faith is weak. It is small. I don't have community. I don't have friends you might be saying. I don't always feel like I have a purpose on this earth. I don't have a beautiful family. How am I expected to hang on if someone like that couldn't? And we are going to address those questions. If that is you know that I see you and I hear you,

and I'm with you in this episode. We are going to talk through this from, of course, a biblical Christian perspective. First, what is depression? We use the phrase depressed a lot. We like to say, oh, I'm so depressed about this or I'm so depressed right now when we are like mildly disappointed about something or temporarily discouraged. But depression is something that is much deeper, much longer lasting than that. I personally have not struggled with depression.

So if at any point in this episode you would like to point something out to me, if you have struggled with it that you feel is inaccurate or is unfair, please, I welcome that. I would love for you to email me. I have been around people with depression. I've sat across from a friend who was very seriously committing suicide. And I remember the feeling that I had is an outsider looking in of just how dark and how deeply she was into the state. of absolute desperation and hopelessness. So I know from, again, an outside perspective, what a horrifying and dark place this is for people to be, even though I myself haven't personally experienced it. Depression can be something that is circumstantial, or it can have nothing to do with their circumstances at all. So it can be because of trauma or tragedy or difficulty,

something that has happened to you, like abuse in your life, either recently or a long time ago when you were a child, some kind of dire diagnosis that you've gotten or something that happened in your life, like the death of a loved one or a lost job. It can also seem to have nothing to do with what's going on, nothing to do with anything that has happened to you. It can just be this dark cloud that kind of comes over your mind when maybe you least expect it that you desperately want to push away, but you don't know how and you don't feel like you have the power to do it. You try everything you can. You repeat the positive mantras. You rationalize.

personalize yourself out of it or you try to, and it still you feel like overtakes you. Sometimes you really feel like you just can't get out. This is the description that I have heard from those who have suffered in our suffering from depression. There are a lot of different Christian thoughts on depression. I certainly am not the sole arbiter of this. I am not the end all be all or the foremost expert on this from a Christian perspective. All I know is what God's word says, what the gospel says.

I do feel that that is sufficient to inform us on this. But some Christians are completely against medication. Some are for medication. Some believers believe that depression is somehow indicative of a spiritual sickness or a lack of faith. Some believe it has nothing to do with spirituality whatsoever. The truth, I think, is somewhere in between, depending on the person. What we know for sure as Christians is that there is always, there is always going to be a spiritual. aspect to depression and anxiety always. It can be a physical problem. So a lack of serotonin in the

brain, for example. But because we are human beings with souls and these two things cannot be separated, we are made in the image of God. We can never separate the spiritual from the physical. God made us so that they are intertwined. So that means that there will be both physical and spiritual aspects to coping with and healing from depression for the Christian. That may mean taking medicine, which I believe can be or is a gift of common grace when used correctly. A gift of common grace means something that God has given everyone regardless of whether they are believer or not.

So good food, nature, medicine. It might mean a healing mechanism might mean exercise. It may mean changing how you eat, what you drink, your daily routine. All of these are known to affect our mental states. date. But it will, without a doubt, this healing, coping process with depression will also mean prayer. It will also mean steeping yourself in the word of God, taking every thought captive and surrendering it to Christ, plugging into your church, finding a mentor, having accountability within a Christian community, filling your mind and your time with coming up with ways to

serve other people outdoing one another and showing honor. Why will it require such spiritual discipline because as we have said, even though there are physical aspects to depression, it is ultimately a spiritual war. Because whether it is because of circumstances or because of chemistry, Satan will use depression as an opening to feed you lies. He can use happiness too, by the way. He can use any mental state whatsoever to tempt you into idolatry or fear or control or lust or envy or worry.

and depression is certainly no difference. Depression, because it can feel so dominant in someone's mind, makes the suffer vulnerable to all kinds of very misleading thoughts. So if you are depressed, you feel hopeless, you feel purposeless, you might feel misunderstood, alone, and Satan will do all he can to convince you, believer, that these lies are a reality. He will ask you the same deceptive question that he asked Eve in the Garden of Eden because even though Satan is cunning, he is not creative. He will ask you, did God really say? Did God really say that he will never leave you or forsake you? Did God really say that he is your ever-present help in time of need? Did God really promise hope? Does God really understand what you're going through?

Does God really offer you purpose? I mean, if God were really caring, if he were really loving, you might find yourself start thinking if he really sees me if he really hears me if he's really all powerful and also good and compassionate and all of these things that the bible says that he is if he is who he says he is why wouldn't he heal me uh why wouldn't he why wouldn't he why wouldn't he why wouldn't he let me escape from this why would he let this happen to me if he can take this away and he loves me why wouldn't he he's healed other people everyone else seems to have it together so why doesn't he heal me? Doesn't he know how badly this hurts?

Doesn't he know all the good that I've done? There's no good that's going to come out of this, out of me being depressed. There is no glory for him to be had in this. You might be thinking. And Satan is there telling us, yes, you're absolutely right. He has forgotten about you. He has forsaken you.

He has abandoned you. He doesn't really care. And you might think, okay, well, maybe he's not who I thought. Maybe he's not real at all. A good God certainly wouldn't do something like this or let something like this linger. So maybe the good God that I read about in the Bible doesn't even exist. And then suddenly, in a matter of minutes, maybe, you have found yourself on the precipice of abandoning all your faith, wondering what life is about, wondering if there is any reason

at all for you to even be on this earth. And you are right where Satan wants you to be, where he has worked very hard for you to Satan may not be able to read your mind, but he can push you down a spiral of desperation so deep. You don't even know how you got there. He will warp and manipulate and obscure the promises of God and the character of God until you no longer know what you believe, until you no longer know what you have faith in. Whether your depression, again, is circumstantial or chemical or both, this is Satan's goal. So when you are depressed and you are told to pray more, you are told to read your Bible more,

you are told to take your thoughts captive more, to hand them over to the king of the universe so he can exchange them for truth, know that this is not meant to shame you. This is meant to equip you. Yes, there may be people who tell you that your depression is just because you're not trying hard enough and maybe they are trying to make you feel even worse about yourself. but when most of your fellow Christians give you a spiritual prescription, a biblical prescription for internal pain when they encourage you in the word, try not to take offense. Try not.

I know what's hard. I do. Try not to get defensive. While medicine and counseling, I believe, do have their place and in certain cases can be extremely necessary and beneficial, these will never ever produce any lasting good without Christ. Satan is powerful. and he is not going to bow down to antidepressants. Ultimately, we do, whether we struggle with depression or not,

need the healing power of Jesus Christ to give us any real peace. We can try to keep the symptoms at bay with certain mechanisms, but only Jesus heals the wounds of the heart and the soul. Only Jesus and his word can stay our anxious thoughts in combat lies with truth. Only Jesus can do that. And now we need to know who this Jesus is, what his character actually is, what his power actually is. Is he this on high untouchable magistrate?

Is he looking down from his throne wondering when you're going to get it together? Is he this unsympathetic schoolmarm chastising us when we just don't get it? Is he a gal pal telling you exactly what you need to hear, stroking your ego and making you feel better about yourself? No, this is who Jesus is. Hebrews 4 14 through 16. Since then, we have a great high priest who has passed. through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are yet without sin. Let us then with confidence drawn near to the throne of grace

that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. So Jesus is neither a buddy who tells you what you want to hear to feel better, nor is he a ruler disconnected from the needs of his servants. He is a great high priest, so that means he is holy, he is clean, he is an intercessor between God and sinful man, but offering himself as a sacrifice on our behalf. He is able to sympathize with us,

so to understand, to comprehend, to fully grasp, to feel for himself our weaknesses and our temptations. And yet he overcame them, because he was without sin. He who knew no sin became sin so that we could become the righteousness of God. He never gave into that temptation. He claimed victory over those temptations. And this empathetic intercessor has made it possible for us through him to approach the

eternal God of the universe with confidence, with assurance, with boldness to do what? To receive mercy and grace and help and time of need. So how good is God? Instead of thinking, God, why would you do this to me? Maybe we think, wow, how undeserving am I to receive this kind of confidence and boldness and grace and mercy when I need it most? How compassionate is our father in heaven that he would give us such a gift in Christ when we were yet sinners. How merciful of him, not just to grant us salvation in Christ, which he never had to do, but to help us fight through our how miraculous that Jesus left his throne, that he became flesh so that he could feel what we feel, so that he could be tempted the way that we are tempted so he could be able to say to us, I understand. I get it. I know how you feel. I know what you're going through. Been there, done that. This is why 1. John 4.4 says, greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world. Because that he already outsmarted all of Satan's schemes. Because he resides.

in you, we have every reason to hope, every reason to stand strong. Ephesion 6 makes clear that Christians are not in a merely physical battle, no matter what it is, whether it's depression or whether it's persecution. We are battling against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. And because of that, we are to put on the full armor of God that is characterized by truth, by righteousness, by readiness, by faith, by salvation, the Holy Spirit, prayer, yes. This goes for those who are depressed, and this goes for those who are not.

The Bible is very clear that you are not alone, that you are not misunderstood, that you are not purposeless, that you are not hopeless, that you have a Savior who knows every single part of you, every single nook and cranny of your heart. Nothing is hidden from him. The Bible says that darkness is its light to him. There is no, no secret, no secret that you can keep from him. When he died on the cross for your sins, he knew every single transgression, every single slip up, every single mistake, every single word of blasphemy, every doubt, every worry,

every thought of suicide. And he said to you, mine. This is mine. Your struggle is mine. You are mine. You are mine forever. He said, I want all of your heart, all of your soul for all of eternity, no compromises. not because you are good or worthy or deserving, but because I am good and merciful and gracious.

God is not spiting you with your depression. He is not punishing you. He is not playing a trick on you. God does not lie. He is not deceptive. He has not left you. He is not impatient with you. If you are in Christ, you are a child of God.

And it is impossible, impossible for God to forsake you because it is not in his character. I do not have to have experienced thoughts of suicide or depression myself to know the character of God that I read in His Word and to tell you these things for sure. We all need people who are in a different place than we are to tell us what God's Word says. And if you forget these things, here is my encouragement to you if you find yourself in that place of not believe in this. Don't let yourself sit in your doubt. There is this almost morbid gratification that all of us get from building on our worries

I understand because I will lay in bed at night and think about all of the conflicts and potential conflicts that I have in my life, all of the reasons to worry. It's almost like whackamol. I rationalize myself out of one anxiety and then something else comes up. It's almost like my flesh is addicted to worry. And so instead, I mean, this happened actually just a couple nights ago. I was building on all of my worries. And finally, I just had to let it go. And I just had to say, I am not giving my thoughts to Christ right now. I am not taking my thoughts captive and surrendering them to the God of the universe. Instead, I am gratifying my flesh by building on this anxiety and hoping that I will be able

to control these situations how I want to. And that is sinful. That is wrong. So while I might not know exactly what you're going through, exactly what you feel, I can tell you that it does no good to sit in your doubt. It does no good to sit in that desperation. I have to tell myself, do not go to the next thought. Do not go down the spiral.

Do not build on the foundation of fear that you have just laid for yourself in your own mind. Stop. Do not give credence to your paranoia. Instead, you have to preach the gospel to yourself. You have to preach it to yourself until you fall asleep at night. You have to preach it to yourself until it's all you can think about. You have to preach it to yourself relentlessly until you can't anymore. And when you can't, you call your friends.

And when you can't, you call your pastor and when you can't, you call your counselor or you listen to this podcast episode if you have to and you fill your mind with the gospel, which is that you were bought with a price by a good God who loves you. And if that was all that God ever did, if everything else were taken away from us, if we were depressed in a dark state of depression that we couldn't get out of for the rest of our lives, God would still be good because he sent his son to die for us and he didn't have to do that. is enough. The gospel is enough for you. That doesn't mean that all of a sudden you'll feel happy. It doesn't mean that all of a sudden you'll be in a good mood, but it does mean that it is sufficient to stay you and to help you persevere. Do not stay dwelling on your desperation. Do not get obsessed with self-help, with self-betterment. You will be frustrated. Instead, focus on Christ on being obedient to him with your whole life, loving others when you feel like you can't. because one thing that might sound harsh, but I think is important to say that we all who are biblical Christians know is true is that depression does not excuse us from living a life of holiness.

It doesn't excuse us from the need for repentance. It doesn't excuse selfishness or complacency. The fight might be a little bit harder, but it's not an excuse to give up. The world certainly will not tell you this. It will tell you the opposite. The world has garbage answers. for every single problem that you have. It will tell you that healing is found in indulging in whatever you want,

whatever will give you gratification right now. And I'm not saying that happiness is bad and things that make you happy right now are necessarily bad. But the world will tell you to go wherever you can to find that gratification, even if it will end up hurting you in the long run. What the world will offer you in terms of healing from depression is self-love. That's all it's got is self-love, which is self-love, is of course some kind of circular argument that will end in torture, which is why you should not

buy it. You will end up frustrated and even deeper in your depression because you will wonder why, even though all of these awesome people are telling you to love yourself more, why you can't muster up the strength to do that. You have followed the five steps to a happier life. You have read every self-help book you have toned your arms you have cleaned your room you have washed your face and you still can't love yourself you still don't look in the mirror and see biance that is because we were not created to be healed by self-love and self-care we were created to be healed by jesus and his provision for us you were not made to rely on yourself none of us were we are interdependent creatures. We are made to rely on our creator. We were made to rely on relationships as well.

So don't beat yourself up. If you can't repeat that positive mantra and feel better right away, don't get mad at yourself when the self-empowerment talks that you give yourself in the morning. Don't make you feel any better. That is not the fuel our souls were meant to run on. It's like putting diesel in a car that doesn't take diesel. You're going to run for a little bit. You'll be okay for a few miles, but ultimately you're going to stall out. So shifting just a little bit, what if pastors who commit suicide? What does this mean? Does this mean that there's not hope for the rest of us?

Does this mean that there's no hope for lay people who are struggling with depression? Unfortunately, pastors committing suicide happens often. I assume, I assume I don't know every person's story, of course, but I assume part of it has to do with isolation. I think a lot of pastors also feel the pressure to put. up a facade of happiness and kind of got it togetherness and end up crippling under that weight, which I think most of us probably would. I think it's important to remember that pastors are human beings, that they are vulnerable to Satan's attacks, they are susceptible to illness. I do believe that pastors who are going through seasons of depression and anxiety need reprieve.

They need to take a step back. They need rest. They need elders who step in and say, hey look it's it's time for you to take a break to allow us to help you uh pastors have to set an example for their churches in this because this is the right thing to do and teachers have different pressures and different responsibilities and the rest of us do um i know that's not always easy for elders to do because depression likes to hide behind a smile sometimes uh that's why church leaders and the rest of us just friends and family members need to pry for lack of a better word we need to nag uh we need to ask questions. We need to check in. I'm speaking to myself as I'm saying this because Lord knows I'm imperfect in this arena. We need to be the body of Christ. If your right hand is

hurt, what do you do? You let your right hand rest and you let your left hand take over. And that's what we have to do for members of the body. Our brothers and sisters in Christ who are hurt, we take over. We carry the weight. We do the work. We share their burdens. This is another reason. I know we talk about this so much the culture of self-love because it's so pervasive and toxic. This is another reason why the culture of self-love will end in nothing but narcissism and further depression and suicide. Because of all of us are only concerned with loving and serving ourselves. There is no one to shoulder our burdens with us. There is no empathy for the pain of others.

No one willing to inconvenience themselves. Sacrifice their time and energy on your behalf because they were told that they shouldn't have to worry about. that, then we are truly alone. That's not how God created human beings to work. That's not how he created us to live and to flourish. I do want to answer this question that so many people have asked. Is a Christian who commits suicide going to heaven? And I was really confused by this question at first. I was like, where did this come from? I don't, I don't understand where people are even getting this idea. I've never heard that before. But then I thought about it. And I kind of understand the reasoning, I think, that people have behind it. Suicide is a sin. It is a sin because murder is a

sin and suicide is self-murder. God values human beings much higher than that. So would a true Christian, I think probably the reasoning goes, would a true Christian who has the Holy Spirit inside of them commit murder? And that be the last thing they do. They're unable to repent from that. I just don't believe, according to what I read in God's word, my opinion doesn't really matter. God's word matters. And so if you feel that I'm wrong on this according to Scripture, please let me know. But I don't feel, according to what I've read in God's word, that in the case of suicide, that giving in to this temptation as you are clouded by depression, means that you are condemned to

eternal damnation. I just don't. I don't see that in scripture. It's a dark moment. It is the wrong thing to do in every. case and yet for the Christian, I do see in God's word that this is still covered by the blood of Christ. If there is still grace and forgiveness, is it a tragedy?

Is there, are there going to be negative and terrible consequences, not just for his kids, but probably for generations to come because of the trauma that his family has been, has experienced because of this? Yes, of course, there are earthly consequences for things that God forgives us for and gives us grace for. but I simply don't see any scriptural support for saying that this is the sin that causes people who proclaimed Christ, who called upon the name of the Lord, who were saved to go to hell. I just don't see any scriptural support for that.

Again, if you want to send me an email with a contra opinion, you can do that. But please bring scripture to support that. I just don't have any understanding of how God's grace could work that way. So I hope that this was an encouragement to you. There's so much more that we can talk about and no doubt that there are people out there who know a lot more about this subject than I do. But the beautiful thing about being a Christian is that we know the answer to everything. It's not easy, but it is very simple that the gospel is sufficient for whatever circumstance

that we are in. And that is not meant to say that if you are struggling, that you just don't believe enough, But there is a place for encouragement from people who aren't in your situation to preach to you, to tell you what's true, to just remind you because our minds can play tricks on us. The Bible says that our hearts are desperately wicked. Who can understand it? So when you hear people say, just follow your hearts, well, that's going to lead you into some really dark, into some really bad places.

We shouldn't be following our hearts. The Bible also says proverbs, I think it's three, five through six is to lean not. on your own understanding, but in all of your ways, acknowledge him and he will make your path straight. We are not able to make our path straight on our own. We're not even supposed to rely on our own understanding because it is so faulty. And when you are in a dark, depressive, vulnerable, desperate state, Satan has no regard for that. He is not a respecter of persons. He is no respecter of persons in that he is willing to trap anyone in lies. He wants to deceive anyone, gosh, if he can get someone to the point of believing that their life is completely purposeless,

that their existence doesn't bring any glory to God. If he can stop someone from sharing the gospel, if he can stop someone temporarily from believing the gospel for themselves, and that's what he's going to do. That brings him, I won't say joy, but that brings him glee. That is what he is set to do, is to deceive. Jesus said that that is in his nature to lie. He is in the father of lies. He is the father of lies. He can't do anything except for deceived. So if you find yourself believing something that you know is not supported by God's word, you need to ask yourself, is this a lie from Satan?

And if so, you need to stop thinking it. Don't build upon it. Don't go down the spiral of believing it because it's going to get you nowhere and is not going to heal you. As always, if you have questions, if you have comments, please email me, alley at the conservative millennial blog.com. You can message me on Instagram as well. I would love to hear from you. I would love to hear also what is encouraging to you when you are in this state. If you have struggled with this before, if there are verses or passages or quotes based on scripture that have helped pull you through and kind of shown you the light at the end of the tunnel,

I would love to hear that. And maybe I can share it so that other people can benefit from it as well. Thank you guys so much for listening. You guys mean so much to me. I love hearing from you and just kind of having this friendship with you guys. You have no idea how much I value this and value the time that we get to spend together. I hope that you guys have a great rest of your Monday, and I will see you back here on Wednesday. Hey, this is Steve Day.

If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested together. first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this T-Day show right here on Blaze TV

or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us.