Intro: Researchers at Columbia University conducted the study with 199 women at an in vitro fertilization clinic in Korea. Unknown to the patients and their doctors, groups of strangers from the US, Canada, and Australia were asked to pray for their success in getting pregnant.
Pictures of patients in the test group were sent to the people praying when the women began hormone treatment and prayer continued for the next three weeks. No one knew which group was which until the three weeks was up.
The patients in the study were all undergoing in vitro fertilization, an assisted reproduction technique in which a man’s sperm, and a woman’s eggs are combined in a laboratory dish, where fertilization occurs. The resulting embryo is then transferred to the uterus to develop naturally. According to the latest statistics from the American Society of Reproductive Medicine, the success rate of in vitro fertilization averages 22.8 percent live births per egg retrieval.
To the surprise of the researchers, the women who were prayed for ended up with a significantly higher pregnancy rate than those who were not prayed for. "About 50 percent got pregnant in the prayer group and about 26 percent in the non-prayer group," the lead author of the report, Dr. Roger A. Lobo, Columbia’s chairman of obstetrics and gynecology said on Good Morning America. The study appears in the current Journal of Reproductive Medicine.
Dr. Elizabeth Targ, a psychiatrist at the Pacific College of Medicine in San Francisco, has also tested out prayer on critically ill AIDS patients. All 20 patients in the study got pretty much the same medical treatment, but only half of them were prayed for by spiritual healers. Ultimately, 10 of the prayed-for patients lived, while four who had not been prayed for died.
In a larger follow-up study, Targ found that the people who received prayer and remote healing had six times fewer hospitalizations and those hospitalizations were significantly shorter than the people who received no prayer and distant healing.
"I was sort of shocked," says Targ. "In a way it’s like witnessing a miracle. There was no way to understand this from my experience and from my basic understanding of science." Abcnews.com; “Can Prayer Heal”
Depression: A hopelessness that’s not consistent with reality. A temporary condition emotional state with exaggerated feelings of sadness. More than discouragement that makes negative circumstances overwhelms a person’s life.
Symptoms of depression:
1. Weight loss or weight gain.
2. Loss of sleep and energy.
3. Lose interest in most or all pleasurable activities.
4. Reduced ability to concentrate.
5. Overcome with feelings of hopelessness or uselessness.
One of England’s finest preachers was C.H. Spurgeon (1834-1892). Frequently during his ministry he was plunged into severe depression, due in part to gout but also for other reasons. Sometimes he would be out of the pulpit for two to three months at a time. In a biography of the "prince of preachers", Arnold Dallimore wrote, "What he suffered in those times of darkness we may not know...even his desperate calling on God brought no relief. ’There are dungeons’, he said, ’beneath the castles of despair.’"
Arnold Dallimore.
Many years ago a young midwestern lawyer suffered from such deep depression that his friends thought it best to keep all knives and razors out of his reach. He questioned his life’s calling and the prudence of even attempting to follow it through. During this time he wrote, "I am now the most miserable man living. Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell. I awfully forebode I shall not." But somehow, from somewhere, Abraham Lincoln received the encouragement he needed, and the achievements of his life thoroughly vindicated his bout with discouragement.
Today in the Word, MBI, December, 1989, p. 20, Swindoll, You and Your Problems Transformed by Thorns, p. 58.
There is a character in Scripture that experienced sever depression. Elijah was one of the greatest men in all scripture. Elijah saw God do some of the most powerful miracles and revivals in the Bible. God dropped Elijah in Israel’s history when Ahab was leading the nation as far away from God. Jezebel made Elijah look like a choirboy in comparison of wickedness.
Depression is something that nearly everyone battles with in life. According to Psychiatrists Frank Minrith & Paul Meier, the majority of Americans suffer from a serious, clinical depression at some time during their lives. Most of these people never get help....they just fight this battle on their own.
And....fighting depression can be an incredibly painful thing. In fact recent studies of more than 11,000 individuals found depression to be more physically and socially disabling that arthritis, diabetes, lung disease, chronic back problems, hypertension, and gastrointestinal illnesses. The only more disabling medical problem was advanced coronary heart disease.
In chapter 18 Jezebel was infuriated with Elijah because they have been in a famine that God brought about at the word of Elijah. So here Jezebel is dry in the mouth and unable to find Elijah so she started killing off the prophets. Jezebel can’t get to Elijah so she gets to his buddies.
THE TIMING OF DEPRESION:
5 factors of depression
1.His depression came after a time of intense ministry output.
More pastors resign on Monday than any other day of the week. Because depression hits right after a time of intense ministry output.
2. After relational conflict. Problem with boss, breaking up with boyfriend, argument with wife.
3.After physical exhaustion. Just killed 450 false prophets. Prayed intensely for rain, and then in the power of the Holy Spirit ran for over 20 miles. If you could ask Elijah on this day what he had been up to. He would’ve told you; “Well I confronted the idolatry of an entire nation, challenged and entire cult and it’s leaders and killed them, fasted and prayed down fire from heaven, called on God intensely until it rained, then ran 20 miles ahead of a man in a chariot. Do you think Elijah was tired? The truth for us is sometimes after we’ve put to much into work, family, church and recreation we try to white knuckle it, grit our teeth and get everything done. We are prone to depression. When your tiered your really vulnerable to the discouragement that leads to depression.
4. After a major victory. He saw the whole nation of Israel come to revival all at once. Athletes wonder why they feel so empty with the trophy in their hands; students wonder why they feel so unfulfilled with the diploma in their hands. Mothers wonder why they can’t stop the tears with a healthy kid upstairs in the crib.
5. After a huge disappointment. What did he expect when Ahab told Jezebel. He expectations may have been for this wicked couple to hit their knees in repentance and say; “out with Baal and in with Jehovah.” But it didn’t’ happen. The fact of the matter is that Jezebel was even more furious with Elijah and even more intent on killing him. Jezebel was some kind of hard hearted.
When we get depressed we don’t want to take responsibility for our situation. Chapter 19 verse 10 Elijah pours out his heart and tells God he is the only one left, all alone and ready to die. When we’re depressed we don’t want someone to come along side of us and say; “you’ve made bad decisions and that’s why you’re in this situation.”
HOW TO GET DEPRESED IN THREE EASY STEPS
1. Find a place by yourself. After he ran for his life he dumped his servant. All by himself he went a days journey in the wilderness to be alone. Depression shuts out the thing we need most: people. Don’t want to face people. When we gather in Sunday School class of caring people...when we come into a church service in the house of God with Christian friends we draw strength for life’s battles. So when you are struggling with depression don’t go somewhere alone...this only intensifies the pain....find Christian friends to be with so they can minister to you. Remember Galatians 6:2 says, "Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ."
2. Focus on the negative. We all have negative times in our lives, but when we make little things in to big things and let them overwhelm us. This enhances our loneness. Elijah wasn’t all alone, what about Obediah that brought him the news of hiding prophet of God? Elijah knew he wasn’t all alone. He examined his life and felt he had accomplished nothing. Everyone who tries to live for God accomplishes more than they realize.
3. He forgot God’s provision. God provided through a widow who had nothing. Called down fire from heaven, saw one of the greatest revivals in Israel. God had never failed Elijah. Has God ever failed you? We forget the faithful provisions of God and all He has done for us.
Choose the cure to depression:
1. Let God confront you. God meets Elijah in a cave. God ministers grace to Elijah in the cave. God wants to minister grace to us in times of depression. We always want God to do the WOW stuff, God reveals Himself to His people in a still, small voice.
2. Receive God’s provision. He sent food and rest to Elijah.
3. Do what God says immediately.
4. Get involved with people again. God gave him a special friend Elisha. A person whom he would pour the rest of his life into.
5. Focusing on other people’s worries helps you to forget your own.
In essence God reminded Elijah that there was an entire nation that needed his ministry.
And one way to deal with depression is to help others.... Philippians 2:4 encourages us to, "....look not only to our own interests...needs...but also to the interests of others."
Dr. Carl Menninger once gave a lecture on mental health and was answering questions from the audience. Someone said, "What would you advise a person to do if that person felt a nervous breakdown coming on?" Most people thought he would say, "Go see a psychiatrist immediately," but he didn’t. To their astonishment, Dr. Meninger replied, "Lock up your house, go across the railroad tracks, find somebody in need, and help that person." To overcome discouragement, "Don’t focus on yourself, get involved in the lives of other people."
Even the Godliest people get down at times. Even Jesus experienced discouragement in the garden of Gethsemane in Matthew 26:37-42 where He said to His disciples, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here & keep watch with Me. Going a little farther he fell with his face to the ground & prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will."
Illustration: Depression strikes about 10 million Americans within any six- month period. Human therapists can now treat only a fraction of that number. But a study shows that by using computers, more of these persons might be helped. In the American Journal of Psychiatry, researcher John Greist presented a study showing that depressed people treated by computerized questions and answers improved just as much as those consulted under a human therapist.
Resource, Mar/Apr, 1990.
Conclusion: And Elijah did get through this time of depression in his life. God gave him other mountain tops of accomplishment...and you know, even though at this low point Elijah asked God to take his life....even that never happened. Elijah never died....remember 2 Kings chapter 2 records that he was simply taken up into heaven in a whirlwind. So remember....depression is a cycle...a tunnel...something you go through.
Several years ago, an experiment on endurance was conducted at the University of California at Berkeley. The experiment involved placing Norwegian field rats in a tub of water, where they were forced to swim until they grew exhausted and finally drowned. During the first experiment, the researchers discovered that on the average, these rats were capable of swimming for over seven hours before drowning.
A second experiment was conducted, exactly like the first but with one exception.This time, when a rat was getting too exhausted to swim any longer, the researchers would remove the rat from the tub of water for a few seconds, then put the rat back into the water to continue swimming. These rats were able to swim for almost 20 hours before perishing.
The researchers concluded that the rats in the second group were able to swim so much longer than the first group because of one factor: they had HOPE. They had experienced a rescue---and what kept them going was the HOPE that they would be rescued again.
