Depression is of the DEVIL - A Follow Up

My last post, "Depression is of the DEVIL," was well received. Several of my followers, however, were confused whether I was talking about "Spiritual Depression" or "Clinical Depression." The answer is that I was talking about both.

Since, though, I didn't talk about clinical depression outright in that post, I will do so in this post. I am going to organize the discussion by question and answer as I have received a lot of questions as to how you can just "have more faith" and it lead to being physically healed of a disease. In light of all that, let's get started!

Q1: "Does the Devil really cause CLINICAL depression? I don't think he does because clinical depression is a medical condition."

Yes the Devil does cause it. Remember that I said God can use it and allow it, but He does not cause it. "But without faith it is impossible to him." (Hebrews 11:6) Therefore a lack of faith is a sin. So not having faith in God is sinning. What happens when we sin? We're turning away and disobeying God. THIS being the case, think about what it means for God to try your faith with depression. God is allowing your faith to be tested because you don't have enough! He has to give you some, but since you won't take it, He allows you to be attacked by His enemy: Sin and therefore Satan.

All of this means that the Devil is still the ultimate source of the depression. Whether he's attacking you, or whether God is allowing Him to. Further, just think of the opposite. If depression isn't of Satan, then from whom does it originate? The world operates from a Good vs. Evil standpoint--so if it isn't of Satan than you're saying it is of God. To say God wants you to be depressed makes no sense (see Nehemiah 2:10).

"Well okay. Just because God doesn't cause it doesn't mean Satan does!" someone responds. Then who? Not God, not Satan....then who? Is there a third powerful being that does things to us in this world? Absolutely not. It's one or it's the Other.

Q2: "Can God actually heal clinical depression?"

While the answer to this question is obvious, some people would disagree. Some people would contend that you cannot just "pray away" depression because depression is a physical imbalance of chemicals in your brain. I would make two observations:

1. God Can Do It!

Psalm 103:19 is clear that God is in control of everything (He is sovereign). That being true, how can you say "God can't heal depression."? If you can be driving along, and someone pulls over on you, and God causes the other car to miss you by half of an inch, then God can fix a chemical imbalance in your brain. Perhaps, after you pray, you will feel this unusual urge to eat a squash. Then come to find out it had the chemicals in it your brain needed! God created you, your brain, and the chemicals it needs--therefore it's ridiculous to say that He can't bring them all together and heal you of clinical depression.

Further, Jesus Christ promises us healing. Notice the parallel in these two passages:

Isaiah 53:3-7, "³He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. ⁴Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. ⁵But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. ⁶All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. ⁷He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth."

Matthew 8:14-17, "¹⁴And when Jesus was come into Peter's house, he saw his wife's mother laid, and sick of a fever. ¹⁵And he touched her hand, and the fever left her: and she arose, and ministered unto them. ¹⁶When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick: ¹⁷That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses."

At first glance, you might think that Isaiah 53:5 is talking about healing us of sin. But notice the correlation! Matthew said Jesus Christ fulfilled the prophecy in Isaiah 5 not by dying but for physical healing! Matthew said, "they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick:" Why? "That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses."! What does this mean? It means the Jesus Christ came to heal SICKNESS! As a believer in Jesus Christ, you have the privilege of access to Jesus Christ's HEALING! Not only that, but it's what proves we are believers! Consider Mark 16:17-18:

^"17And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; ¹⁸They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover."

HEALING! People will know you are Christians because you can HEAL people through Him! He came to bring Salvation! Salvation not only of the spirit but of the body--how could we serve Him and bring others to Christ if our own bodies don't work? Our bodies are temples (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)! The physical temples of the Old Testament were kept incredibly clean. Why? They were very very holy. In the same way, Jesus will keep OUR (HIS) temples holy and clean!

And just in case you were wondering, "Esaias the prophet" is the name of the Prophet Isaiah. KJV just translates it into a different English name than the actual name "Isaiah".

2. I'm Not Saying God Can't Heal Through Medication.

Don't misinterpret anything of what I've said to mean that those who need medication can stop taking it, pray, and will be better (if you have faith that will work, though--see Matthew 19:26). God can certainly use medication to heal you of depression--I'm just saying don't assume it's the only way to be healed of it. Your God created you, knows about your depression, created all the medication that exists (and the doctors who invented them), and--most important of all--He controls all of it! God can heal you through whatever means He chooses--medication is one of them just not the only one.

Q3: "You do realize some people NEED medication?"

Yes I do, but the reason some people NEED it (in the fullest meaning of the word) is because of something I said earlier in my first post about depression:

"...The only reason it may take God slow steps to break down one of Satan's fortresses in your life is because you have been subject to him for so long...."

Now if you're coming from the standpoint of, "but I never have been subject to Satan! I am trying to follow God and somehow this is still attacking me. THAT'S why I need medication." If this is the case, we still get back to what I said in my original post:

"...You will not be tested above what you are able. Mark it down--it's a promise of the Living God. Your depression will not get that bad! Either it will go away or it will be dealt with by God. That is why you can be cheerful about it! It will end at some point in one way or another--you just have to trust Jesus to bring it to pass..." and I would add "He won't let you take more than you can handle." (see 1 Corinthians 10:13).

The scenario goes like this: either you're rebelling against God and not letting go of some sin in your life (or you aren't a Christian to begin with) OR God is testing your faith and it WILL end in the near future. It's either/or. There is no, "but my situation is different!" Either you've let Satan gain a foothold in your life one way or the other, or God is testing you and you have to stand firm. If you give up and don't stand firm, you will end up on the Devil's side of the issue (because you're sinning by giving up--because giving up is not having faith in God and therefore a sin against God [see Hebrews 11:6]). This doesn't mean you are JOINING the Devil or that you even want to join the Devil--it just means that any thought you think or action you take that says "God can't" or "God won't" or "maybe other people but God can't/won't not for me" is originating from Satan. "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." (James 4:7)!

The Greek word for "flee" ("φεύγω") means "to run away (literally or figuratively); by implication, to shun; by analogy, to vanish:-- escape, flee (away)." Resist the Devil and his depression and he WILL run away from you--and all CONCERNING you. Why? The Greek word for "you" ("ὑμῶν") means "of (from or concerning) you:--ye, you, your (own, -selves)." God says that if you submit to Him and resist the Devil, the Devil will RUN AWAY from you and anything that CONCERNS you. Depression fits both of those. You ABSOLUTELY can defeat depression. It is a truth of the living God that He will help you--if you trust Him to.

Q4: "Come, and let us return to the Lord; For He has torn, but He will heal us; He has stricken, but He will bind us up. - Hoesa 6:1 Doesn't that verse show that God does cause it and not just allow it? "

God does cause it--but only in the sense that He allows the sickness to come upon us. The best way to handle questions like this is to assume they were true. If you were to answer "Yes." to the above question, you would be saying that God causes sickness. If God causes sickness then you have a real problem because Scripturally you can prove Satan is the causer of sickness (see Job for example). So to say that both God and Satan cause sickness is to assume that Satan and God both have some equal power--which they do not. God cannot cause sickness because sickness is a result of the Fall.

This which brings us to another interesting point: the Fall was an event that was not God's doing. God created the world perfect, so He certainly would not allow it to be destroyed. If God caused sickness you would be in effect imply He had something to do with causing the cause of sickness--the Fall. Which He did not.

Therefore, to answer your question, no that verse does not prove God causes it--"He has torn" and "He has stricken" are just used to show that He is the ultimate source of power and control--but not the direct cause of the problem. He is the cause in the sense that He caused it to be allowed to harm them, but not in the sense that He made them sick.

Q5: "Are you saying depression is sin? Anything of the Devil is sin, so that's essentially what you're saying."

Staying in depression on purpose is a sin. Now do not read that to mean if you are depressed and can't get out of it you are sinning--that's not what I mean. I mean that if you're purposefully keeping yourself in a down state to make people notice you, that's a sin. But if you are depressed and want to get out of it or hate being depressed, no that is not a sin. To explain why, I would make a comparison. If depression is a sickness, and it's a sin, then it is sinful to catch the common cold. That obviously makes no sense because you have no control over catching the common cold--no more than the control you have to stop depression from coming upon you.

I still want to be clear though: I am not, nor even meant to imply, that depression is a sin. The Devil afflicts many people, but that doesn't mean that you're sinning because you're being afflicted. Sin is only something you choose to indulge in. Therefore if you are willfully staying in your depression for attention or whatever else, that's sin--but just being depressed because of medical conditions or because of a traumatic event in your life is not. For example, look at the Psalms. They are laden with despairing passages--but that was because David was genuinely down and in need of help--not because he wanted to be depressed. In fact, David gives some useful guidance on depression when he said (Psalm 27:13-14):

"¹³I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. ¹⁴Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD."

CONCLUSION

I hope this clears up what I meant in my earlier post about depression. Yeshua can heal you--just trust Him and don't give up. If you have questions, comment them below and I will edit this post with my response.

הוה' (Yahovah--God/Jesus Christ) bless,

Robert A. Rowlett