Depression, Anxiety, Mental Health... Do Bible Verses Help?

I’m at our weekly prayer time at my church. The person who did the devotion spoke about mental health. I’m not discounting her experience, but I believe differently. The advice she gave for those who are struggling is to reach out to others, to start back on an old hobby or start a new one, or to go to a Christian counselor. 

While those are good things, the very definition of depression (or at least major depressive disorder) is that you can’t do those things. There have been many medical studies of the brain that show that the areas that make a person have the ability to do those things are messed up, smaller than they should be. It is literally pretty much impossible to help yourself out of a true mental health depression state.

Now I’m not saying that God can’t work. He can heal. He can heal the brain (something I have never thought about until I was typing the words right now). Support from others can be a major part of that healing. 

But the person who needs the healing can’t reach out. It’s up to the Church to do the reaching out. It’s up to the Church to pray for those who need help. It’s up to the Church to encourage hobbies by inviting a person who is struggling to come with them.

As I write this, I’m in an “up” cycle of the bipolar disorder I still deal with. I’ve been awake since 12:30am, and while I might get tired later, I’m not at all tired now. I’m fully of “ready-to-go.” I couldn't have slept if someone bribed me with a huge sum of money in the wee hours this morning.

I don’t know if the person who spoke deals with chronic mental illness. Maybe she said mental health and I translated it as mental illness. With mental health issues, maybe the advice she gave will work. 

Even if that’s what happened, the problem is that many others might do what I did - mix-up the terms. At the end of her devotion, she shared several scriptures about not being afraid, not being anxious, etc. I’m not saying the scriptures aren’t true, but it’s just… not… that… easy… If it was, I wouldn’t have struggled for the majority of my life with these issues. My husband wouldn’t be so depressed that he can’t look for a job. There wouldn’t be a need for psychiatrists and medicine and licensed counselors.

And there is. There always will be. Because putting the healing on the sick person isn’t what will heal them. God, through the work of the Body, is the only thing that will.