Breaking down the Walls
“What to do When you Hit the Wall”
Jeremiah 20:7-10, 14-18, 11-12
Distance runners, those who run marathons especially often experience what is called hitting the wall. A marathon is a 26 mile run and they say it usually happens around mile 20. Your energy runs out, your legs can become numb, muscle coordination is difficult and doubt begins to set in. And you wonder, will I ever reach the finish line? One runner described hitting the wall this way. He said I felt like an elephant had jumped out of a tree onto my shoulders and he was making me carry him the rest of the way. In life, all of us go through times when we seem to hit the wall. Sometimes we see it coming, many times we are caught completely off guard. Hebrews 12:1-2.
These walls seem to come in different forms but they do have a purpose. (1) They are there to test us. (2) Walls challenge us. (3) Walls offer us a goal to reach. A popular speaker has asked more than 100,000 Christians across the country this one question: is there anyone present who has never, ever been depressed? The answer: through all of his speaking engagements not one person responded. Christians get depressed too. They always have. From the writers of the scripture, even the spiritual giants of the Bible, very few people have been able to completely escape it’s effects.
Look at David, the psalmist. In Psalm 42 he wrote, “why am I so discouraged? Why am I so sad? Now you might say, well most of the spiritual leaders in the Bible never had trouble with depression did they? After you look at the OT, the easier question might be to ask which leaders didn’t struggle. If you read Numbers, chpt 11 you hear Moses cry out, “God I wish you would kill me. I can’t bear leading these people any longer. All they do is grumble about how good things were back in Egypt. Please just kill me. Remember that was Moses. Then we find Elijah. He had gone to battle with the false prophets and won the battle by calling down fire on a water logged altar and the entire altar was consumed. Following that he ran into the wilderness crying out to God, saying just kill me! I’ve had it with this business of being a prophet. Then Jonah. Jonah is a preacher. What does a preacher want more than anything. For people to respond to the message. But strangely enough Jonah preaches with such great power ane he becomes depressed afterwards. Why? Because his preaching was so successful.
Then of course we encounter Jeremiah. This is perhaps the worst case. He seems to have hit rock bottom. But at the same time, of all the OT prophets who does Jesus quote more than any other prophet? Jeremiah. Listen no man in history could have possibly served God with greater integrity in more difficult circumstances than the prophet Jeremiah. Yet this chapter shows just how depressed this man was. This book, Jeremiah sort of reads like a diary. As we read it it is like we are looking over Jeremiah’s shoulder as he writes It is as though he is not really writing to any particular audience...it is like personal thoughts between Himself and God. It was not a letter.
I think the wonderful thing about this diary we are reading is that it is actually inspired by God, it is Holy scripture. This book helps us get an answer to the question of why men and women can become depressed. Look at verse 7 again. Now this brings us to a very important question. I think the answer is obvious by now but here it is...can a believer in Christ become depressed? And if we can, how does it happen, why does it happen and what can we do? First what are the causes. For Jeremiah reason #1 was what I will call Divine Deceit. Jeremiah says God you tricked me into being a prophet and now for all these years i have preached your message and I have gotten no response at all. This is common among pastors by the way. There is a standing joke among pastors that more pastors resign on Monday mornings than any other time. Why? Because often there is no response....at least that we see. Remember Jeremiah had spent 20 years preaching to his generation...with no results...none. So he began to think/imagine that God had deceived him into doing something he wasn’t called to do.
This wasn’t the first time Jeremiah prayed a prayer like this. Earlier we hear him say, Jeremiah 15:18 (Living) Yet you have failed me in my time of need! You have let them keep right on with all their persecutions. Will they never stop hurting me? Your help is as uncertain as a seasonal mountain brook--sometimes a flood, sometimes as dry as a bone." This is what he would call Divine Deceit. Now I am not saying that God would ever deceive us. I am saying that often God’s people begin to think that God has deceived us. And if it can happen to Jeremiah it can happen to us as well. Many of us have had thoughts like this:
* God I believed that if I married in the faith that it would be like heaven. Instead it’s just the opposite. Things in my marriage are not turning out like you promised.
* Lord, I’ve always lived you taught us to live, I’ve been honest in all my dealings. But my life is in the pits. Things haven’t worked out like you promised. Or
* Lord I thought if I gave you a 10th of my money that everything would work out OK. But they haven’t worked out like you promised. We have all looked at heaven at some point and imagined :divine deceit.” And if Jeremiah could fall into that trap any of us can.
Then there is a 2nd reason. I would call it repeated rejection. V. 7. I am in derision daily, everyone mocks me. There was repeated rejection from the people around him. Besides feeling God was deceiving him, he believes the people all around him have rejected him. Actually Jeremiah wasn’t paranoid. The people really were whispering about him.
He had been preaching death and destruction for 20 years and that kind of message doesn’t exactly win friends and influence people. In v. 10 he says “all my friends are waiting for me to slip.” Picture it as he passes by they say shalom, peace to you Jeremiah, (rubbing hands together) just wait till he slips up. Then we will get revenge. His family was no better. If you go back and read chapter one you find that when his family heard he was being called to the ministry they actually began to plot his death. A pastor friend of mine who pastors a large church here in Florida told me that he was already married when God called him to the ministry. When he told his wife she said, hmm I believe one of us made a mistake. It happens.
All of this rejection began to get to Jeremiah. He couldn’t turn to family, friends and didn’t believe he could turn to God either. Now most of us have never had a whole nation whispering about us but we all know what it feels like to be rejected. It may go all the way back to your childhood. Maybe the kids were choosing sides to play ball and you were the last one to be chosen. Perhaps you were turned down from a job. Or maybe someone you love just ignores you. Rejection is hard and the feelings stay there for a long time. Dr. Robert Elliott, a well known cardiologist was giving a lecture to a group of doctors when he had a heart attack right in the middle of his speech. From that experience he wrote a book titled Is it worth dying for? In the book he describes the impact rejection has on our lives. Back in the 60's he was sent by the government to deal with very highly skilled young men who work at Cape Canaveral. It was a critical time...the space program was being forced to cut back. After each space launch the total work force was being cut by 15%. These highly intelligent young men, some under 30 years of age were literally dropping dead under the stress of not knowing if they would be next. Rejection not only hurts, it kills.
Look how Jeremiah responds to all of this. In v. 14 he curses the day he was born. Instead of singing happy birthday he was saying cursed birthday. Ever heard someone say I wish I was never born? Maybe you have said it. I’ve heard plenty of people say it. Jeremiah was saying it. Depressed people will say it and here’s the deal...they all mean it. These are not idle words.
* Some curse the day they were born.
* Some become angry with those who love them the most. Why? Because they expect that person to make them better and they can’t.
* Some become very bitter. The writer of Hebrews says LB 12:15. When Jeremiah cursed the day he was born he didn’t stop there. In verses 15-17 he curses the man who announced the news of his birth. Then he said he wished that the man who announced it had taken a sword and killed Jeremiah and his mother right on the spot. So what do you say to someone like Jeremiah? Cheer up man. Things will get better. Preachers, Prophets shouldn’t get depressed. I don’t think so.
I like what Martin Luther said about Jeremiah. He said those who say Jeremiah is not spiritual enough have never really experienced the stuff of real life and ought to keep their mouth shut. His depression did not mean he was not spiritual. In fact, Jeremiah was a spiritual giant but like all of us, Jeremiah was having spiritual growing pains. And it in those pains that we find the answer. This is when Jeremiah throws up his hands and says God I’ve had it! Verses 11-13.
There are at least 3 lessons we can learn here to get on top of depression instead of being under it. You see it’s a wall we hit and we have to get through it. Lesson #1. Remember this truth. Even though God is sometimes silent He is always working in our lives. I imagine Jeremiah had decided that God had closed up shop and had left town afer he had preached for 20 years without any response. But then he realized that even in the silence, God is still at work. When Jesus was on the cross one of the last cries he made was to God...he says Father! Father! Why have you forsaken me? At that moment I want you to hear God’s answer. Listen closely. (Silence) At that moment Jesus needed his Father more than any other and his Father was completely silent. But know this, God was busier than at any other time in history as all of our sins, past, present and future were being accounted for, paid for in full.
Lesson #2. Regardless of how bad things seem, never, ever quit talking to God. The prayer of Jeremiah is not exactly an eloquent prayer. It’s blunt. Almost rude. Almost disrespectful. But as bad things were one thing he would not do is stop talking to God. Our tendency to many times is to complain, as though we’re talking about God behind His back. Guess what? He still hears you. So talk directly to Him. Pushing Him away is never the answer.
Lesson #3. You must reclaim the promises of God and reclaim the praises of God. Somehow even when he was at his lowest, Jeremiah began to remember the promises God had made to him years before. V. 11 and 13. He started remembering all the good things God had done. And he began to praise God. Listen, we can do that. You and I can experience the same change in our lives. Most of us here today have sat where Jeremiah sat. You may be there today but with God’s help you can break through.
