So last week we began this short series on Defeating Depression and Suicidal Thoughts. We talked a lot about how prevalent depression is and how the pandemic has made that even worse. So many people just feel like giving up. Knowing the time we live in, and knowing it will only increase and get worse can make us lose all hope if we are not careful to guard our hearts.
Keep your heart with all diligence, For out of it spring the issues of life. – Prov. 4:23
Last week we talked about Elijah’s depression. This week we’re going to talk about a few more people in the Bible who showed signs of depression and even suicide.
King Saul committed suicide. His suicide was situational and done out of fear of abuse by the enemy. Understandable.
1 Sam 31:1-4
1 Now the Philistines fought against Israel; and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines, and fell slain on Mount Gilboa. 2 Then the Philistines followed hard after Saul and his sons. And the Philistines killed Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua, Saul’s sons. 3 The battle became fierce against Saul. The archers [a]hit him, and he was severely wounded by the archers.
4 Then Saul said to his armorbearer, “Draw your sword, and thrust me through with it, lest these uncircumcised men come and thrust me through and [b]abuse me.”
But his armorbearer would not, for he was greatly afraid. Therefore Saul took a sword and fell on it.
Judas committed suicide. Judas’ suicide was situational and done out of regret for what he had done to Jesus.
Matthew 27:3-5
3 Then Judas, His betrayer, seeing that He had been condemned, was remorseful and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, 4 saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.”
And they said, “What is that to us? You see to it!”
5 Then he threw down the pieces of silver in the temple and departed, and went and hanged himself.
And there were others – Abimelech (Judges 9:50-54), Samson (Judges 16:23-31), Ahithophel (2 Samuel 17:23) and Zimri (1 Kings 16:15-20). So those plus King Saul and Judas make six people in the Bible that committed suicide.
Jonah. Jonah was really angry, he did not want the Lord to save Nineveh because he just thought they weren’t worth it.
“Now O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.” Jonah 4:3
And even after God reached out to Jonah again with great compassion, he responded, “…I am angry enough to die.” Jonah 4:9
I have heard it said that depression is repressed anger.
Jonah 1:1-10 (NKJV)
1 Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, 2 “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before Me.” 3 But Jonah arose and went the other way!!
to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid the fare, (“he paid the fare” - have you ever noticed that it always COSTS US when we don’t obey the Lord or when we go our own way?) and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
4 But the Lord [a]sent out a great wind on the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship was about to be broken up.
5 Then the mariners were afraid; and every man cried out to his god, and threw the cargo that was in the ship into the sea, to lighten [b]the load. But Jonah had gone down into the lowest parts of the ship, had lain down, and was fast asleep.
6 So the captain came to him, and said to him, “What do you mean, sleeper? Arise, call on your God; perhaps your God will consider us, so that we may not perish.” Perhaps your God will consider us shows they had open hearts about the One True God.
7 And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know for whose cause this trouble has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah. 8 Then they said to him, “Please tell us! For whose cause is this trouble upon us? What is your occupation? And where do you come from? What is your country? And of what people are you?”
9 So he said to them, “I am a Hebrew; and I fear [c]the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.”
10 Then the men were exceedingly afraid, and said to him, “Why have you done this?” For the men knew that he fled from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them.
So we are in good company if we suffer from depression and suicidal thoughts, aren’t we? Lots of examples in the Bibie. Numerous reasons it can happen and nothing to beat yourself up for. Yall, life is not easy. Being a Christian in this time is not easy. And we live at the END of time – definitely not easy. We are watching the wickedness in our world increase almost by the minute as the final battle between good and evil approaches! These are not really events we can ignore! We are going to have feelings about them! Other generations could live their life plan and plan for the golden years, but our generation is DIFFERENT. God chose us specially for this time. We may feel inadequate to face the challenges of this time, but we can trust the Lord knew what He was doing when He chose us!
1. Biggest Danger of Untreated Severe Depression
Untreated severe depression, also known as clinical depression can lead to suicidal thoughts and even suicide.
According to the CDC, Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States.
There are more than 100 suicides per day in the U.S. ALONE and that will increase drastically – and I do mean DRASTICALLY when the judgments start happening. It will also increase very noticeably when the economic crash hits. So over 4 people per hour die by their own hand which means by the time I finish this sermon, two more people will have taken their own lives. Two more families devastated. That’s a very serious problem. And those two people could be someone related to you, or to me.
Why would anyone take their own life?
Okay, so why exactly do people commit suicide? What would make a person want to stop their own heartbeat? That takes a lot of courage, you know – to stop your own heart. To end your life. To take the decision away from the God who created you and into your own hands when you should pass from this life into the next.
Sometimes it is a major life event that triggers the pain leading someone to commit suicide. Sometimes they feel trapped in a bad situation. Sometimes a mental illness motivates them.
But every time, it is because they lost hope and feared the future. When people have hope, they are willing to live, but when they lose all hope anything can improve and they fear the future, that’s when they are more willing to pull the trigger, swallow the pillows, or drag that blade over their wrist.
How To Help Yourself Out of Depression
- The devil will try to convince you that there is something wrong with your faith and that’s why you haven’t been able to overcome this. He whispered that same lie to me years ago. When he does it to you, REBUKE him! I rebuke you, Satan, and I command you to leave me NOW in Jesus Name!!
- Now there IS a generational curse of depression. If you see suicide in your family, a generational curse may be at the root of the problem.
This week when I was working on this episode, I happened to tell Nicole what I was doing and she sent me a link to a video where Michael W. Smith from House of Healing was talking to Joshua Feurenstein about depression that described three types of depression – I’ll include a link to the video in the description here.
Michael W. Smith, who does a lot of teaching and deliverance online House of Healing - (see https://hardcorechristianity.com/) teaches that there are three distinct types of depression. This was the first time I had heard the way he defines them, and I think he is right.
1. Dysthymia – Low grade gloom that lasts for more than 2 years. This is what psychiatry often calls Complicated Grief. Michael W. Smith says that pretty much every case of Dysthymia he has worked with was a SPIRITUAL DEPRESSION. So for this kind of depression, we would want to look at deliverance. This is the Spirit of Heaviness described in Isaiah 61:3. I think this is the Spirit of Grief.
2. Situational Depression – Usually not spiritual – this is like depression because you lost your job or someone died. – Very normal, not long lasting. Usually not longer than a few months.
3. Clinical Depression – This is long term, and also must be broken spiritually – makes you doubt God, etc. This also involves the Spirit of Heaviness.
Link to their video about Depression: https://youtu.be/HPw6h5D97iM
1. My Brushes with Suicide
Years ago before I was saved, I knew someone who committed suicide – a man who worked on our sister crew developed stomach cancer. When he got towards the end stages, his quality of life must have decreased dramatically. There was nothing the doctors could do to make anything better. He had lost all hope. And he took his life.
Anyone who has known me for very long online knows I lost my younger brother to suicide in 1987. It was one of the most painful events I have ever suffered in my entire life. Our entire family was devastated. Suicide shatters a family like nothing else. Grieving people hurt and they look to cast blame. Blaming makes it so much worse. And then there is the way you blame yourself. You spend the rest of your life thinking you could have stopped them, but let me tell you this. If a person is truly determined to end their life, they will eventually find a way and NO ONE can stop them if they are determined enough.
When I was working a job in Woodward, Oklahoma in I think it was 2006 or 2007 or so, the young man in the room underneath mine committed suicide. I heard the gunshot, but didn’t know until the next day what it truly was. I thought a truck at the truck stop next door had backfired.
A close friend in another state in 2015 who had lost her children told me she had attempted suicide. I tried to comfort her and encourage her. Then I stopped hearing from her, and I knew what had happened. We were really close, emailed all the time. I knew her for years. She would never have just stopped emailing. She had succeeded. I didn’t know anyone in her family, so no one notified me of her death, but I knew.
Okay, so let’s talk about some ways to help yourself (or another person) if you are really depressed. I always found the simple things helped me the most. That may or may not be true for others, but here are some suggestions to try to lift yourself out of depression:
1. Get some fresh air and sunshine. We spend SO much time these days in front of our computers or staring at our phones. When Jesus comes back to get the Bride, I’m concerned a lot of the world will miss what happened because they’re staring at their phones. I used to spend all my time indoors, too, until I got my dogs. They not only improved my life and level of happiness, they improved my physical health as well. They rescued me just months after the stroke.
The single thing I found joy in most often during that terrible depression after I lost two family members 2 months apart was going to Cottonwood Park in Dallas and feeding the ducks and geese. I am an animal lover and find a nearness to animals very comforting. Helping them always brightens my day. Walking in the park was something else I loved doing. Or sometimes I would sit on this one grassy slope with a view of the pond. Towne Lake Park at McKinney has a fountain and an extended walking path. That was another favorite.
2. Cast down those tormenting thoughts. All sin begins in the mind. You will win or lose your battle there. That’s why Paul wrote:
2 Corinthians 10:3-5
3 For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh:
4 (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)
5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;
I found the following on of all places, LinkedIn. It is the best description of casting down imaginations I have ever read!
Casting down imaginations (not accepting the devils thoughts, suggestions, visions) is a spiritual weapon that you must use to be victorious over the enemy.
You must learn to actively fight to maintain God’s vision for you. You must only accept imaginations (thoughts) that line up with the Word of God. Fight for the field of your imagination. Don’t give the devil one inch, to sow his imaginations. Resist him at all times and he will flee. James 4:7 says “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” Many have struggles resisting the devil and casting down his imaginations, because they are too fleshly.
It is the Word of God that strengthens you, and then spoken from your lips, defeats the enemy. You must strengthen yourself spiritually, by putting the Word of God in you. Study it, read it, memorize it, quote it, and confess it as truth. Begin to fast and pray (you can fast from foods, pleasant things, television, reading the newspapers, etc…) and pick up the Word of God, put down, or put out the television, and other things that keep you from God’s presence and moving in His power.
Exalting The Word Of God.
You can exalt and magnify God’s Word or imagination (vision) for a circumstance, by declaring (confessing) that word over, and over again, by praising God for His Word and the manifestation of His Word in the circumstance that you are facing.
If you don’t see an immediate manifestation of God’s Word, then the devil will try and start a conversation with you as to why. You do not need to defend the Word of God that you are declaring. Speak the Word of God about your situation, and don’t entertain the devils thoughts or conversations.
3. Break the Generational Curse of Depression.
Prayer to Break the Generational Curse of Depression
Father, I submit myself completely to You and ask You to forgive me for my sin of believing the lies of the spirits of depression, sadness, hopelessness and despair, as well as suicide and death, and all sins related to being depressed. I confess every sin of control, manipulation and witchcraft, which I know are against what Your Word says.
I know Your Word says the joy of the Lord is my strength, so I am strong in You and I repent of and renounce all thoughts of depression, sadness, hopelessness, despair, suicide and death, and I turn from all of those now in Jesus’ Name.
I also come to You and repent on behalf of my forefathers for their sins of control, manipulation, witchcraft, and believing the lies of depression, sadness, hopelessness and despair and all sins relating to depression, not to obtain forgiveness for them, which isn’t possible, but to ask You to remove the iniquity of those sins from me, Lord, and I ask for that now.
Now in the Name of Jesus, I command the generational curse of depression and any Curse of Confusion to be broken off my life NOW – I command it to fall to the ground and become as nothing, in Jesus’ mighty name! I command every demon associated with witchcraft, control and manipulation, depression, sadness, hopelessness, despair, suicide and death to clean up your filth and pick up your seeds and depart from me and go into the Abyss imme-diately in Jesus’ Name! I plead the precious Blood of Jesus Christ over my mind, body and life. Lord God I praise You and I thank You for the precious Blood of Christ and the authority of the Name of Jesus! Amen.
You can find the prayer to break the generational curse of depression on the website – www.justpraisehim.today in the Prayers Tab.
4. Do self-deliverance. At Michael W. Smith’s website, https://hardcorechristianity.com, there is a plethora of helpful information that’s free and you can also buy an 18-lesson course on healing/deliverance that comes on a flash drive for $55. He has teachings out on youtube, too. Nicole has listened to a lot of his stuff and she says its really good, so if you really need help with self-deliverance, I recommend you spend some time on his site, hardcorechristianity.com because good balanced teaching on deliverance is rare.
You know part of the reason our world is where it is is because it has become politically incorrect to call sin SIN. The world wants to do what it wants to do and it doesn’t want you and me saying its sinning when it does it. Well, if we don’t call it sin, we can’t deal with it, can we. So the sin just continues to grow and to fester like a nasty infection. There’s also a belief out there that all the demons left when Jesus ascended to heaven and nothing could be further from the truth, but most churches don’t have the knowledge or the manpower to deal with deliverance. And the result is people who are hurting and who really DO want to call it sin and be RID of it don’t know how to do that. I remember going through that after I got saved.
5. I looked for someone that needed help, and then helped them. Sometimes spending a half day in a soup kitchen, feeding the poor or handing out meals and serving the needy changes your whole point of view. When we are depressed, we become very self-focused. It’s natural to focus on where we hurt so don’t beat yourself up about that, but working with the poor and needy will always help us to see our own situation much more clearly, and it provides a welcome relief from our own anguish.
6. Practice self care. I am a workaholic, so I’m not as good at this as some people are. I see my body as a machine I need to push to do as much work for the Kingdom of God as I possibly can in whatever time I have left on earth. I want to give God all I’ve got and that’s how I do that. Practicing self care means to feed yourself nutritionally sound food, hydrate and get fresh air and exercise. It also means resting when you are tired, like Elijah did. Elijah was going 90-to-nothing doing the Lord’s work and he probably forgot to eat and got all run down, so the Lord sent him some takeout to help him recoup. That and rest helped him a lot.
7. Put on the Garment of Praise. I saw this garment in a vision when I lived at the old house in Princeton. It looks like its made of pure white light! If you know some praise songs you like, play those and praise God to them! It’s hard to stay sad when God shows up to inhabit the praises of His people! Real praise will literally drive OUT that spirit of heaviness. And pure worship – just turning on worship music and adoring God out loud drives out every bad thing I can think of! Praise brings Him down to us because He inhabits the praises of His people, but worship takes us into HIS realm and we will feel His Presence!
8. Cast out the demonic spirits related to depression and suicide: I’ll give you the short version - In Jesus Name, I bind up depression, suicide, hopelessness, despair and heaviness and I cast you into the deepest pit in Hell right now. I forbid you from ever returning to me or anyone I love for all eternity in Jesus mighty Name – Go NOW!! Go to hardcorechristianity.com for further instructions. Its important to understand deliverance if you’re going to do it. We don’t ever want to be like the Sons of Sceva who had to flee naked from the demons when they tried to cast them out “in the name of Jesus whom Paul preaches..”
9. Find some promises in God’s Word and start confessing your way out of your situation. If you Google Scriptures Against Depression, a number of options come up. The Word of God says the Mouth of the Upright shall deliver him. (Prov 12:6)
10. Download an app to help you take the Word with you. There’s an app for confessing scriptures now – LOL. I have not tried it but it looks helpful online. You can look up scriptures and confessions to say by subject like if you’re angry, or you’re sad, etc. It’s called the Shut Up Devil Scripture & confession app: and you can find I at shutupdevil.org. I can’t make this up, yall.
11. Prayer to the Lord if You Need Help with Depression
Precious Spirit of God – Lord I come before Your Throne to entreat Your help. You are my life, Lord. Lord Your Word tells me to cast my cares on you and You will bear the load. Your Word says to come to You if I am heavy laden and You will give me rest. Lord, I have been so weighed down with everything going on in my life and in the world around me. Thank you for carrying this load for me, Lord. You are the Prince of Peace and I ask You would fill me with Your peace today, Lord. My mind and spirit need your peace. I need rest.
Lord Your Word says You know the thoughts You think towards me, thoughts of peace and not evil, to give me an expected end. Help me remember You are always for me, Lord. Help me to put on the Garment of Praise to drive out the Spirit of Heaviness. You alone give wisdom, knowledge & wise counsel and I ask for those things now, Lord. I ask for the wisdom and knowledge to navigate this situation according to Your Will and Your Will only, Lord. I give You all the praise and all the glory for this help, Lord. Only You.
In Jesus Mighty Name I pray, Amen.
12. If you are trying to help someone else who is depressed or suicidal. Following is a prayer to pray for someone else who is depressed or experiencing suicidal thoughts.
You should remit their sins to make room for the Lord to get in their heart and do a work, and also you can travail for them – cry out to God until the burden lifts from you and you know you’ve prayed through it. Travailing is how my grown children got saved. I’ll be talking more about travailing on an upcoming podcast. Also – confess several times a day that they will live and NOT die. I used this method years ago for someone who was suicidal and it broke it.
You can get this prayer to pray for someone else who has depression on www.justpraisehim.today in the Prayers Tab.
PRAYER FOR SOMEONE ELSE WHO IS SUFFERING DEPRESSION
Spirit of the Living God, I come before Your Throne today to pray for _______________________, who seems to be suffering from prolonged sadness. Lord, I don’t know what else to do to help, but I know You do. I know You go with ______________________________ wherever he/she goes and that he/she is not forsaken, but I don’t think he/she knows it, Lord.
In the mighty Name of Jesus, I remit the sins of ______________________ so that you can make an opening in his/her life to do a work, Lord.
Lord I know You came to set the captives free. You are our shield and the lifter of our heads and I ask you to make Yourself known as that in ___________________’s life. I pray You will be a protective shield around ______________________ and give him/her hope. A lot of hope. I pray you would give him/her the strength to rise up with wings as eagles – to rise up above the problems and circumstances of this life. I pray most of all, Lord, that You would awaken _______________________’s spirit and roll back the stones of unbelief from his/her heart. I know You are near to the broken-hearted. Please bind up his/her wounds and heal the depression and any suicidal tendencies in him/her.
I decree by the Power of the Blood of Jesus that he/she shall live and NOT die!! Lord I give You all the praise, and all the glory for saving and helping _______________________.
In Jesus precious Name I pray.
Amen
