Psalms 42:5A
“Why art thou cast down, o my soul? And why art thou
disquieted in me?”

Depression…hopelessness, despair, misery, gloom, heaviness,
distress of mind.

Depression…There are those who say depression is caused by a chemical imbalance, emotional problems, or the trials and
 tribulations of every day life. Others say the root cause is of a
spiritual nature. I just know how it has affected my life and the
lives of those that I love.

Through it all, I have learned that no matter what the cause, there is
 only one solution, and that is Jesus Christ. He came to set the captive free and break the chains that have us bound to our past.
The things that happened to us as a child can cause depression. We
have memories that bring heartache, and to avoid the hurt we suppress those memories and bury them deep inside. However, they may not
 stay buried but manifest out in other ways. We may experience uncontrollable rage, feelings of worthlessness, and an inability to trust.

 We may build walls around us to protect us from the hurt that we have learned to expect from people, because that is all that we have known.
Years may go by and we may think that we have managed to live a ‘normal’ life. Then suddenly for no apparent reason, depression will
rear its ugly head and weigh us down and make us grow weary. At
 these times, we have no clue as to how or why depression has
managed to overtake us.

The cares of this world and the loss of a loved one or job will contribute to depression, magnifying it and causing distress of mind. The bills
 may be piling up with no relief in sight. We may be having health problems, or on the verge of divorce.
We may wonder what is happening and where is God in all this.
We may not want to wake up in the morning and we may want to crawl back into bed and cover our head! We may feel listless; not knowing what to do or not do and all we want to do is cry. At these times,
we may avoid people.

At times we may feel like an ‘elephant’ had climbed on our shoulders
 and was grinding us to the ground! We never imagine that the feelings we are feeling now, this ‘depression; are the symptoms of the past shattering our facade of normalcy. A past that we thought we had left behind us, or had managed to forget ever happened. Nevertheless it is still there, waiting to ambush us when we least expect it.

However, there is good news! We can be free. There is a healing from the Father above that will lift the weights that has burdened and bound us. He will give us freedom that will make our steps lighter and put a song in our heart.

John 14:27
“Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither
 let it be afraid.”

As we look at this verse, I want to point out several things. First the statement: “let not.” In the Greek, that word not is ‘absolute denial,
God forbid.’ We have a choice whether we let our hearts be troubled,
 or whether we have the peace that Jesus gives. He gives us His peace; it us up to us whether or not we ‘accept’ that peace, to allow it to reign
in our lives. I know that sometimes we cannot control our circumstances or the things that are going on around us. However, we can control our reactions to them. We do have control over whether we are going
to let our heart be troubled or afraid.

The peace that Jesus gives is His peace: (Greek meaning: of me,
mine own) If we do not have the peace that Jesus gives, (His peace) when things happen that trouble us, then the reaction is ‘worry.’
We are anxious, troubled on every side, and fearful. This produces stress, which comes from outside pressures, such as financial concerns, sickness, lost job or relationship, etc. Stress and the pressures from
the outside not dealt with produces pressures that come from the
‘inside.’ Our reactions to these ‘pressures’ will be feelings of guilt
 and shame, anger, and low self-esteem. Stress and the ‘inside
pressures’ can produce sickness, of body and mind.



Proverbs 4:23
“Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.”
We are to watch over and guard out heart. The seeds of anger, guilt, shame, are seeds (tares) planted by the enemy. Any seed, good or bad,
if allowed to grow, will produce a ‘harvest.’ The heart (mind) has the power to ‘cultivate’ the negative seeds planted; if we
do not deal with them at the root, (bottom, deep, underground, secretly growing) eventually they will take root inward, and produce a
harvest of ‘fruit’ (depression) outward.



When we are agitated, worried and depressed we are not ‘one with
the Father.’ Believers are the ‘bride of Christ’, and that indicates ‘oneness.’ Depression restricts the flow from Him to us. We are ‘disconnected’ and as such do not have the peace that passes all understanding. “Peace” in John 14 means:
Prosperity, quietness, rest, set at one again. When we are anxious
and fearful, there is no rest or quietness, just clamor and confusion.



My friends, this is not the ‘abundant life’ that Jesus came to give us! However, it all goes back to that ‘choice.’ Let not……if we keep our eyes on Jesus and not the problem, we can choose to have a heart free from worry and anxiety.



Mark 11:23
“For verily I say unto you, that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in
 his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall
 come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.”

Who so ever shall say UNTO this mountain……..it is not enough to
 talk ‘about’ the mountain, we have to SAY UNTO it, be thou removed.
 If we are laboring under a heavy cloud of depression, we tend to just
 talk ‘about’ the problem. If we have negative seeds of doubt, anger, fear, guilt, and shame in our hearts (minds) we will be powerless to ‘speak’  to the mountain in our lives!



I have just come out of a period of depression, and let me tell you,
it can weigh you down and keep you unproductive and powerless.

I have been without a job for three months, and that is a long time!
God has been faithful to meet my needs, and for that, I praise and
 thank Him. Nevertheless, even after a lot of effort on my part, I am
still jobless. I don’t know what God had in mind through all this, I just know that today I am set free, and as Delores says in her article,
I am ‘resting in my tent.’
Resting In My Tent

John 14:27 has always been a favorite scripture of mine, and today it spoke to me in a completely new way! A few days ago, three wonderful friends of mine, Linda, Pat and Christine, were instrumental in helping me to break through the depression and to realize the cause of it. Depression has plagued me all my life, and I did not know the root
cause of it, therefore did not deal with it at the ‘source.’ Through their prayers and standing with me, God peeled away the ‘layers’ of hurt, anger, bitterness and unforgiveness that had caused me to suffer with bouts of depression. As I forgave each one that had hurt me in my life,
 I was set free, a ton of ‘weight’ was lifted from me in the spiritual
 realm. I was delivered!!!

God Restores My Soul

Psalms 23:3

“He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness
 for His name’s sake.”

Restores: in the Hebrew means; to turn back, recover, rescue, and retrieve. God has ‘restored’ my soul, He has rescued me from the pits
 of depression. He has enabled me to go from being a ‘victim’ of depression to living a life of victory. That does not mean there will not
 be problems or adverse situations from this point on, but it does mean that I will ‘choose’ to not let my heart be troubled or afraid when they
 do come. By His Grace I will trust in the God that loves me and
cares for me.

Shirley

  Introduction by Linda  Thank you, Linda! :-)
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