"Do not let yourselves become discouraged," writes Paul in his letter to the Hebrews. That is easier said than done. The world seems to be filled with discouraged people. Millions could be singing the plaintive black spiritual:
Sometimes I feel like a motherless child,
Sometimes I fell like a motherless child,
Sometimes I feel like a motherless child,
A long ways from home, a long ways from home.
In a recent article in a national magazine we are told that depression and despair are at epidemic proportions. Nearly 30,000 Americans kill themselves each year in overt acts of suicide. Another 100,000 attempt to take their own lives. Countless thousands more are killing themselves slowly by less obvious means such as overeating, alcohol and drug abuse, addition to work, etc. In addition to these there are millions more who daily seek to diminish themselves through humiliation and other psychological forms of punishment.
"Do not let yourselves be discouraged," writes Paul.
Jeremiah the prophet knew what it was to be discouraged. God had given him a most unpopular message to deliver to his people. When people came to him to ask him to pray for them --to ask him to seek God's word for them--the message he was given by God was never the message they wanted to hear. Therefore, rather than heeding the message he brought on behalf of God, they sought to kill the messenger. They threw him into an empty cistern. They were going to leave him in the cistern until he died of thirst or starvation. There was no water in the cistern, but there was a thick layer of mud. And we are told that Jeremiah "sank down into the mud."
There have been times when I have sunk down into the mud of life, haven't you? "Do not be discouraged" writes St. Paul. We can heed his admonition because we know that St. Paul knew what it is to be discouraged. He was shipwrecked, imprisoned, beaten and bullied in every possible way but he did not give up or give in. Neither did Jeremiah. Neither of them allowed discouragement and disappointment to defeat them. "Do not let yourselves become discouraged...."
Notice, first of all, that Paul's admonition is written to the saints. It is not written for the benefit of the sinners but for the saved. Christian people do get discouraged.
Lance Webb, in his book HOW BAD ARE YOUR SINS? tells the story of William Cowper, one of England' greatest poets. Cowper was disgusted with the self-righteous goodness of so many Christians he knew.
One day, hemmed in by resentments and futility, isolated from the love and understanding every soul craves, finding only loneliness and betrayal, he was contemplating suicide. In despair he opened his little-used Bible and began to read. His eyes fell on the words, "Since all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, they are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood." (Rom. 3: 23-25).
Suddenly something happened within William Cowper....
The blood of Christ which stirred William Cowper's faith in an hour of despair, when he was ready to shed his own blood in bitter frustration, was an "open sesame" into the heart of God, Whose love was deep enough and wide enough to include him in all his failure and lovelessness.
If to the mighty God he, William Cowper, was lovable, precious enough to permit His son to die for, there must be something in life precious enough to live and fight for.
William Cowper climbed out of the mud of life. But it is important for us to see that Christian people do get discouraged. Indeed, in C.S. Lewis' marvelous SCREWTAPE LETTERS, we come to see that discouragement is Satan's most potent weapon. If he can get Christians preoccupied with their failures, then the battle is won.
Certainly there is enough going on in most churches to discourage even the most hearty of saints. An anonymous poet put it well:
We cleaned our little church today-
Wiped all the dust and dirt away.
We straightened papers, washed the floors;
Wiped off the lamp and painted doors.
We brushed the dirt stains from the books
And whisked the cobwebs from the nooks.
We polished windows so we'd see
The newly greening shrub and tree.
The menfolks, too, raked up the yard-
They laughed and said it wasn't hard,
And, oh, it felt so very good
To have the place look as it should.
We said, "How wonderful 'twould be
If we cleaned out what we can't see-
Such things as grudges, hates and lies,
And musty thoughts much worse than flies."
"Do not let yourselves become discouraged," writes Paul. He was writing that to the saints.
Ironically it may be that good people are more susceptible to discouragement, despair and depression than are hardened sinners. For those of you who think that Christians should always be smiling and bubbly, this may be a hard fact to deal with. But the temptation to discouragement is probably greatest for the guys in white hats. If you will notice, some of the nicest people get depressed.
For one thing nice people swallow an awful amount of anger. We all get angry. Did you realize that? But you say, "Oh, not Aunt so-and-so. Why she doesn't have any temper at all." My friend, Aunt so-and so is just kidding herself. To be human is to experience all the hurts and frustrations that produce anger. It's just that Aunt so-and-so is a nice person. She has learned to turn her anger inward and not outward. She may not even be aware of it but the anger is still there. And some morning she's going to wake up with a bad case of the blues. Freud taught us that depression is anger turned inward.
A British psychiatrist has noted that the suicide rate in Northern Ireland has been on a steady decline during the bloodiest years of their civil strife. If you can express anger toward somebody else, you are not as likely to express it at yourself. The most peaceful county in Northern Ireland has the highest suicide rate.
Nice people get depressed, first of all, because they don't know what else to do with their anger. They do not want strike out at some one who has hurt them or offended them, and thus they turn the anger inward on themselves. By the way, there is much evidence that turning anger inward is a serious health hazard in terms of such things as high blood pressure, ulcers and some forms of cancer.
The 2nd reason that nice people are more prone to despair is that they really do care. Jeremiah truly cared about his people. No wonder he despaired over the message he was to bring them. Paul really cared that Christ's work be done on earth. If you and I care deeply about those things that are good and right and lasting, we are going to have those times of discouragement and disappointment.
The key is not to allow ourselves to sink so far in the mud that we cannot get out.
This bring us to the answer to our times of discouragement and despair. Paul writes, "...Let us run with determination the race that lies before us. Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from beginning to end." The secret of overcoming depression is to keep on! It is to be faithful unto death. In Paul's words, it is to "run with determination the race that lies before us."
The most lasting cure for depression is to stay in the race. Alfred Lord Tennyson said at the death of his closest friend, "I must love myself into action, lest I wither in despair."
Everard Jack Appleton was an invalid for seventeen years. He faced unflinchingly the tragic circumstances that were his. Bedridden for 7 years, his room became a place of encouragement and inspiration for many. Said his good friend one day:
"Jack, what do you do when you can't touch bottom?"
"Then I swim," Jack replied.
"And when you can't swim?" he was asked.
"Then I float," he answered, and he added, "underneath are the Everlasting Arms."
Never give up. The alternative to swimming and floating is drowning. We must stay in the race. We must keep our eyes fixed on the goal. In this case, of course, the goal is Jesus
himself.
The great missionary to China, Hudson Taylor, had those days when the dark clouds of discouragement hung heavy above him. Burdened by meager finances and personal grief (he buried his wife and some children in China), he persisted against strong resistance. He would often say: "It doesn't matter, really how great the pressure is. It only matters where the pressure lies. See that it never comes between you and the Lord--then the greater the pressure, the more it presses you to His breast."
"Do not let yourselves become discouraged..." Good people do get discouraged. But, if we stay in the race and if we keep our eyes fixed on Him who is the source of life, strength, and hope, we can extricate ourselves from the mud of life. We can finish the race. We can be victorious once again.
