Heart and Soul

Lie #3: The Pain is Too Great!

by Mark Sutton
December 4, 2019

IDENTIFYING AND OVERCOMING THE LIES OF DEPRESSION
LIE #3:  The Pain is too Great

I’ll warn you ahead of time:  this will be a tough one.  But stick with me until the end, and you just might find a nugget that will transform your whole attitude about depression.  I know I did.

 
This lie (and remember that Satan is the author of ALL lies) can be expressed in a variety of ways.  

“The pain of my depression is too great, so I’m going to give in to my emotions.”  

“I can’t handle the pain anymore; it’s never going to get better.”  

“This pain means that God is disappointed in me. I have nothing to live for.” 


Please believe me.  All these are LIES designed by Satan to destroy you.  You MUST NOT give in to them. Yes, depression is crippling and sometimes unrelenting.  It can affect every area of your mind and body.  Your strength is sapped and your will to go on disappears.

 
But there is a way out.  It is accomplished by a transformation that includes several steps.  The first one is the big one:  tell God you will obey His word, no matter what your emotions are doing to you.  Decide that pain is NEVER an excuse for you to quit serving or being faithful to God.  


I keep going back to Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane just before He was to be arrested, tried, tortured, and crucified for the sins of the world.  Our Savior was in agony!  Sweat like great drops of blood broke out all over Him and fell to the ground.  He pleaded with the Father to keep Him from the cross.  But Jesus did not use the pain as an excuse to no longer do God’s will!  Instead, He embraced the pain and used it to bring about the greatest victory in all of humankind’s history.

 
This brings us to the second step:  you need to embrace the pain of depression and give it back to God as a gift.  Before you dismiss me as off my rocker, let’s examine this.  I am NOT saying you have to enjoy depression.  I am NOT saying you shouldn’t do everything in your power to get rid of it.  But what I AM saying is that while your depression is with you, don’t be afraid of it or of the pain.  Every day, give your pain to God and pray something like this:

 “Father, today I give you my depression and my pain.  Please use it for Your glory.  May I grow in faith because of it.  May I touch some other person who is hurting and use my depression as a tool to help relieve them.”  

The day I started looking at my depression in this way was the day I began to get better.  In other words, depression no longer used me.  I used it for God.

 
God has a plan for your life.  He wants to use you to touch others.  See your depression as a strength, not a weakness. Let God use your depression and pain to help and heal other broken, hurting people. 
 


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