Each chapter of the book concludes with a recommended playlist of music that was uplifting and encouraging to her. She believes that listening to praise and worship music helped her hold on when her grip was shaky.
To those of us frail human beings who suffer from a shaky grip, or to those who seriously fear not making it through life, God says he will never leave us. We will make it. This book will underscore that biblical truth over and over again. Our first step of making it to the other side of the valley of depression may well be falling into the competent and compassionately written words of this God-honoring book: Hope Prevails.
Marilyn Meberg
Women of Faith speaker and author of Constantly Craving
When the Whole World Is Laughing but You
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Jeremiah 29:11
They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.
Tom Bodett
I know how you feel. Really, I do. I see patients in my office every week with mental health disorders, including depression. I diagnose their condition and make treatment recommendations. Yet all my education and experience didn’t protect me from succumbing to this devastating condition myself.
Professionally, I am a board-certified neuropsychologist with lots of degrees and alphabet soup following my name. I am trained in identifying and treating mental health disorders, and I’ve worked in the field for over twenty years. I know that physiological problems can contribute to depression, and sometimes medication is necessary and helpful in treating it. Difficult life circumstances can usher it in, and sometimes therapy and counseling are also necessary and helpful.
Despite my professional experience, I too have suffered in this valley. I was sad and irritable and constantly felt defeated. My greatest shock came when I tried the same treatment suggestions I typically offered my patients—and they didn’t work. I tried medication, I participated in therapy, I ate right and exercised dutifully, and I even prayed and claimed healing. For me those things weren’t enough.
Only when I started to understand what depression does to us spiritually, as well as what it cannot do, and then started cooperating with God did I finally begin to experience the chains of depression falling off.
I wrote this book to share what worked for me and what can help you. Part of what I realized during my dark journey is that this condition affects us physically, emotionally, and spiritually. The traditional treatments I tried didn’t address the spiritual side of depression. Without addressing this aspect, and without treating the whole person, my healing was suboptimal.
Few books discuss what depression does to us on a spiritual level. That is the emphasis of this book. While I will address what depression is, where it comes from, and ways to treat it, I will also share what it does to us spiritually and how that perpetuates the problem. There is hope that comes from realizing how depression affects us spiritually and what it cannot do to us on a spiritual level.
I’ve written this book because I’ve been there. I know what depression is. I know the shame that tags along with depression like a pesky younger sibling. I know the pain it brings and how it feels to believe no one understands. If someone hasn’t gone through this journey themselves, then they can’t completely understand. I tried many of the tools and techniques that mental health professionals suggest. Some I have recommended to my own patients. Some helped, but they weren’t sufficient. At least they weren’t for me. Not until I realized how depression is perpetuated on a spiritual level and addressed the spiritual issues did I start to walk out of the valley.
I’ve written this book to walk alongside you. In my pain, I desperately longed to have someone walk alongside me—someone who understood the depths of my despair. I needed more than anything to know I wasn’t alone and that I wasn’t worthless because I struggled. I want you to know you are not alone. You may feel alone at times, as I did. But someone does understand. I’ve been there. Our circumstances surrounding the season of depression may be different, but the pain involved is the same.
I’ve written this book to help dispel some of the myths and lies about this condition that make it difficult to see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. I’ve read a library of books about this topic but never found one that helped me understand it from a spiritual perspective. The enemy of our soul thrives on keeping us in darkness and unable to live in the fullness of all God created us to be.
I’ve written this book to offer hope. In the midst of my battle, hope was elusive. I wasn’t sure I would survive. Actually, I wasn’t sure I wanted to survive. But hope—the belief in a purpose, the belief in something better—can make all the difference. Without hope, what reason do we have to get up in the morning? With hope, we want to move forward, press on, get to the other side, and then share with others what we have learned to offer them hope during their times of trial.
Listening to praise and worship music helped me to hold on when it seemed my grip was failing. At the end of each chapter, I include a recommended playlist of music that was uplifting and encouraging to me in the hope that you too will be encouraged. Just to get you started, you might benefit from listening to the following:
“Healing Begins,” Tenth Avenue North, © 2010 by Reunion Records
“Worn,” Tenth Avenue North, © 2012 by Reunion Records
“You Are I Am,” MercyMe, © 2012 by Fair Trade/Columbia
“You Are My Strength,” Hillsong Live, © 2010 by Hillsong Church T/A Hillsong Music Australia
“Shoulders,” For King & Country, © 2014 by Word Entertainment LLC
“Nearness,” Bethel, © 2015 by Bethel Music
“I Feel His Love,” Laura Hackett Park, © 2014 by Forerunner Music
At the end of each chapter, I also offer a “doctor’s prescription” (“Your Rx”)—questions for you to ask or steps for you to take to help you find healing from your depression. Of course, I won’t know if you follow the prescription, but I trust that you are tired of feeling the way you do and want help. I want to walk through this journey with you, and I’m confident that one day you will be in a position to do the same for someone else.
Hope Prevails,
(Dr.) Michelle Bengtson
A Letter to My Depressed Self
Dear One,
I know you are in pain. You feel as if you can’t sink any lower and that no one understands. But I do. I’ve been there.
I’m writing today from where I stand, the other side of depression’s valley. I encourage you to persevere. You will not always feel this way (Ps. 30:5). There are brighter days ahead (Job 11:17; Prov. 4:18).
I’ve learned a few important lessons during the journey out of depression that I want to share with you. So grab my hand or that of a trusted loved one and hang on. Hang in there until you see the first glimmers of dawn.
Everyone faces resistance of some kind in their life, but not all push through the fear and the pain. You can, and I promise you will be so grateful that you did! The first step is always the hardest. Then your success in that step will fuel the next. You will ultimately look back and be thankful, not necessarily for the challenges but that they showed you what a strong team you and God are together (Rom. 8:31) and how he is such a faithful provider (Phil. 4:19).
While I’m intimately acquainted with the loneliness you feel, I promise you are not alone (Heb. 13:5). You cannot see clearly through the searing tears that sting your eyes, but from the other side I’m able to see how God was with you every second of every minute of your despair (Ps. 121).
I’ve always hated the expression “what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.” I know that in the valley there are days you just wish it would kill you so that your pain would end. But from this side looking back, I can see that good really can come from your pain (Rom. 8:28).
Yo
u will appreciate joy, which offers so much more than happiness ever will (Acts 13:52; Gal. 5:22–26; James 1:2–4). You will savor peace instead of worry and dread (Phil. 4:6–7). You will relate to others with a knowing compassion that nothing can imitate (2 Cor. 1:4). You will know God more deeply and intimately than you ever dreamed possible after clinging to him in your darkest nights and begging him to reveal himself to you (Pss. 23; 30:3; 56:8; Isa. 30:19–21; 40:1–3; 43:1–3; Matt. 11:28–30; James 1:2–5).
I know some days your faith is weak and your hope is dim. Even Jesus felt despair when he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). But the truth is God entrusted Jesus with his most important assignment on earth. You too have good work to do that God has divinely purposed for you (Jer. 29:11; John 15:16; Eph. 2:10), and you are a partaker with Christ of a heavenly calling (Heb. 3:1, 14).
I know life is hard and you get frustrated because you don’t see enough progress fast enough. You need to know that is because, just like Jesus, you have an enemy who seeks to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10). But God is greater than any foe who rises against you (1 John 4:4). God has promised that with him you are victorious (1 Cor. 15:57) and you are more than a conqueror (Rom. 8:37; Eph. 3:20; Phil. 2:13; 4:13). He is pleased that you simply love and trust him and want to know him more (Ps. 147:11).
My heart grieves for you because today you wonder where you fit in or if you even fit in at all. That is another lie from the enemy because he doesn’t want you to celebrate your ultimate destiny. Oh, my dear, you not only fit in but are also accepted in the beloved (Eph. 1:6). God has already promised that you are a citizen of heaven (Eph. 2:6, 19; Phil. 3:20; Col. 1:12) and a joint heir with Christ (Rom. 8:17; Gal. 4:6–7).
Some days you feel unworthy, like you don’t measure up. But we all feel that some days. Those are lies from the enemy, who seeks to demean you and devalue you. Your enemy knows the Word of God better than you do. But God’s truth says that you are a loved child of God (John 1:12; Rom. 8:14–17; Gal. 3:26, 28; 4:6–7; 1 Thess. 5:5), you are a new creation in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 2:20; 1 Pet. 1:3, 23), and you are a friend of Jesus (John 15:15). Jesus makes you worthy (2 Thess. 1:11–12).
There are times when you feel like God is angry with you. That is another lie from the enemy. God is for you, not against you (Rom. 8:31). God is not distant and angry. He loves you completely (1 John 4:16). He wants to lavish his love on you (1 John 3:1) because he is your heavenly Father and you are his child. Every earthly father has his flaws, but your heavenly Father is perfect (Matt. 5:48), and he offers you more than any earthly father ever could (Matt. 7:11).
My desire is that you will know how much God loves you (John 17:23; 1 John 4:10) and how he is your greatest encourager (2 Thess. 2:16–17). He loves you with an everlasting love (Jer. 31:3) and rejoices over you with singing (Zeph. 3:17). He considers you his treasured possession (Exod. 19:5), and he will never stop doing good things for you (Jer. 32:40). If you delight in him, he promises to give you the desires of your heart (Ps. 37:4), the very same desires he instilled in you (Phil. 2:13).
Many days you feel like a failure. Dear one, Jesus was the only perfect one to ever live. All of us are failures in comparison to him. The good news is that through Jesus’s death on the cross, he took our imperfection on himself, so now when God looks at you, he sees a child who is redeemed and forgiven (2 Cor. 5:18–19; Eph. 1:7; 4:24; Col. 1:13–14; 1 John 2:12). God considers you a saint (1 Cor. 1:2; Eph. 1:1; Phil. 1:1; Col. 1:2). You are chosen of God, holy and dearly loved (Col. 3:12; 1 Thess. 1:4). There is no failure in falling down—only in choosing not to get back up and press on. God has said that our job is to believe (Heb. 11:6), and when we do that, we have pleased him.
You look at the tasks ahead of you and think you aren’t good enough for the job. Would it surprise you to know that is another lie from the enemy? With God’s help, all things are possible (Matt. 19:26). When you feel tired and weak, remember that God will give you the strength to do anything he wants you to do (Isa. 40:31; Phil. 4:13). Cling to him, because his right hand will hold you up (Ps. 63:8).
My heart longs for you not to worry about how you will manage to meet all your needs. You carry a load that is too heavy for you. On this side I see how much easier it is when you give your burdens to God and take his easier yoke in exchange (Matt. 11:30). You wear yourself out striving—striving to be good enough so that others will like you and so that God will love you. But he already does. Nothing you could do will make him love you more or less. Everything good comes from God (James 1:17). He has already promised to provide everything you need (Matt. 6:31–33). He rewards those who earnestly seek him (Heb. 11:6)—and you are doing that, so be gentle with yourself. If you do your part and believe, he will do his part and provide!
Your recent days have been dark, and you’ve wondered if this is God’s plan for you. Oh, dear one, that isn’t so. It is God’s desire that you prosper and be in health (3 John 1:2). You wonder if you will ever get out of this valley of depression and if the tears will ever stop. Better days are ahead (Ps. 107:43; Prov. 4:18), though perhaps you cannot see them yet. God will wipe away every tear from your eyes, and he will remove all the pain you’ve endured (Rev. 21:3–4).
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life” (Prov. 13:12). The enemy has deferred your hope, but it’s time to reengage your hope and believe the Lord is going to restore what the enemy has taken from you (Joel 2:25).
Take hold of hope and believe that a great outcome will result from the challenges you are currently going through (Rom. 8:28). As a result of your hope, you will experience a strengthening of your faith. When you are tested, don’t let your faith falter. Keep it strong based on all the above promises God has given you. Guard against falling prey to doubt and unbelief. The enemy is looking for a door opened even a tiny crack so he can come back in and whisper more lies to you.
You will rise up out of this pit (Rom. 6:4–5), and when you do, you will share the good news with the brokenhearted, grieving, and poor who will need the encouragement of one who has walked through depression and survived (2 Cor. 1:4).
You will experience the Lord’s favor as he comforts you in your sadness, exchanges your ashes for a crown of beauty, takes your mourning and gives you joy, and takes your spirit of despair and replaces it with praise (Isa. 61:1–3). You will stand firm in the Lord and experience his never-ending joy (1 Thess. 3:8–9). Trust, surrender, hope, and do not fear. Let God take it from here. I am praying that you will have eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart that believes (Prov. 20:12). You will continue to hear from the Lord, so take your desire to go deeper with him into intimate, focused praise and worship, casting your cares on him because he cares for you (1 Peter 5:7). Proclaim his Word over yourself and over your life. You do not have to defend yourself to other people, but proclaim God’s many promises for you (Ps. 68:11) and defend yourself to the enemy, who has been trying to steal, kill, and destroy. Remember, you and the Lord are a majority (1 Sam. 17:45).
Don’t believe for a minute the enemy’s lie that you will have to live with depression forever. God wants for you to enjoy good health, body and soul (3 John 1:2). No weapon formed against you will prosper (Isa. 54:17).
It’s my prayer for you that “the God of hope will fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15:13). God is not through with you. He has plans for you, plans for a hopeful future (Jer. 29:11). You can look into the future with bright eyes at all those things you previously dreamed. God gave you those dreams, and they are yours (Eph. 3:20). God is going to bring you out of this desperate place, and when he does, you will have such hope to share with others (Ps. 81:10).
You are loved,
Me (and God)
1
This Thing Called Depression
I will be glad and rejoice in your love,
for you saw my a
ffliction
and knew the anguish of my soul.
Psalm 31:7
I had some experience in dealing with people who have mental illness and depression, but I didn’t see the signs in myself. I couldn’t ask for help because I didn’t know I needed help.
Clara Hughes
I want to ask you a few questions. No one will know your answers, so answer with complete honesty. The truest answer is likely the one you find yourself thinking, “But I wouldn’t want her to know . . .” Believe me, I’ve thought that very same thing myself—many times.
Do you ever look around you and it seems as if the whole world is laughing but you?
Have you ever gone to sleep one night and awoken the next morning to find your joy, your enthusiasm, or your motivation has disappeared?
Do you hear others speak of joy and think, “I’ve no idea what joy feels like”?
Does it ever feel as if you live in a state of “constant overwhelm”?
Do the simplest tasks require more effort than you can muster?
Would you or those close to you consider you a “glass half empty” kind of person?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, it’s possible you are experiencing or have experienced symptoms of depression.
Depression presents in various ways depending on the individual, but the common thread is that it’s always emotionally painful. Perhaps the description of depression to which I could most relate is that “it’s like drowning, except you can see everyone around you breathing” (author unknown).
Many experience depression, don’t recognize it for what it is, and would be loath to admit it even if they did. Denial never means something doesn’t exist or didn’t happen, just that the pain of recognizing it seems to outweigh the potential benefit of being vulnerable and seeking help. Sometimes it’s difficult to answer the question “What’s wrong?” when we can’t first answer the question “What’s right?”
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