Several people have asked me for copies of an email from Sono Harris that I read at her memorial service. Thought I should share it with more of you. No need to have known Sono in order to appreciate her words and her quotes from Thomas Brooks and John Newton.
This is a picture of Charles Haddon Spurgeon at age 23. Only a year previously, an event happened that brought on a severe depression that he nearly didn’t recover from. (Since this is my third and final blog on this subject, if you missed either of the previous ones you may want to go back and read part 1 and part 2 first.)
Spurgeon’s congregation had grown so large that they had to rent the Music hall in Surrey Gardens (see drawing later in this blog). On June 7, 1891, an overflow crowd filled this huge building. As ...
I’ve received private notes and sympathetic phone calls from people regarding the depression I wrote about on June 30. I appreciate people’s genuine concern, as well as their statements that they’ve been encouraged as they go through their own struggles, many of which are tougher than mine.
As I said in last week’s blog, while the depression has been lifted for now, I have no reason to believe I won’t face it again. The prospect doesn’t frighten me. God has been faithful in the low tides before, and He will be again.
In those ...
I’ve had nearly six weeks now in which I’ve no longer experienced the depression I was battling the prior two months, which I blogged about June 30. (See also part 2 of this Spurgeon series.) Like some physical problems I’ve had, I don’t know why the depression came or why it left. (Add this to my very long list of things I can’t explain.)
While in California, combining vacation and going over the screenplay for Deadline (see my previous blog post), God linked me with two men, one of them a pastor, who told me ...
First, thanks to all of you who sent encouraging notes related to my previous blog concerning depression and Zephaniah 3:17. One dear friend quoted Thomas Brooks, one of Spurgeon's favorite writers: "Ah, believer, it is only heaven that is above all winds, storms, and tempests; God did not cast man out of Paradise that he might find another paradise in this world." So true. Much of what prepares us for our true home is what reminds us that we are aliens and strangers, who are seeking a better country.
Today I'm meditating on Jeremiah 32, especially verses 38 to 41. While written to Israel, the heart and commitment of God extends to all His people in every place and time. God says of his people, "I will rejoice in doing them good." Great stuff. The weight hasn't lifted, but God faithfully keeps it from crushing, and I trust He will make me stronger and more dependent on Him through it.
George Mueller once said something like this (not verbatim, but this is its essence): “I read Scripture until I come to a verse that can bear my whole weight, and then I stop and ponder it.”
That happened to me yesterday, and today I am pondering the same verse. But first, the background, so you’ll know why I’ve found such comfort in it.
Recently I’ve been battling depression. While it’s not chronic for me, it’s periodic. Always has been, and until I'm with the Lord and gazing on His face, I suspect it will be. Some good things have happened lately, and some challenging things. This week I didn’t sleep well, had a few exhausting days, and then had a particularly difficult day in which I needed to ask forgiveness of my wife and a couple of friends for cutting them off in a conversation, when I became proud and impatient because they didn’t agree with something that was important to me.
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