Objection: Mental Illness Is Treatable but Not Curable
This LIE has kept countless people bound by mental illnesses while slashing their bank accounts to pay for seemingly unending prescription drugs that only claim at best to “treat” but not “cure” mental illnesses. The companies that make the pills want you to believe this lie because you will keep thinking that you need their drugs for the rest of your life to avoid the symptoms of mental illness. It’s faster and easier for a doctor to prescribe pills than to get to the real cause of someone’s problems and fix them, and many doctors never even consider the spiritual side of things.
The drug industry has gone to great lengths to indoctrinate TV viewers with the idea that depression is caused by chemical imbalances in people’s brains. That’s so nice to hear – depression isn’t your fault and it has nothing to do with your wrong thinking and dwelling on things that are the opposite of what the Bible tells to you dwell on. That would involve your responsibility and then your effort to reach a cure by changing what you think about. No, it’s supposedly just a chemical imbalance in your brain – a physical condition over which you have no control. Maybe your brain just doesn’t make enough serotonin. You’re physically sick, so you need a physical way to treat your symptoms – ask your doctor if Happiex is right for you, but don’t take Happiex if you’re allergic to Happiex.
But the Bible NEVER makes any kind of statement to the effect that a chemical imbalance causes depression, but it DOES appear to say that anxiety produces depression:
Proverbs 12:25:
Heaviness in the heart of man maketh it stoop: but a good word maketh it glad.
The Hebrew word translated heaviness above is also translated fear, sorrow, care or carefulness. Stoop means to bow or crouch down. The NKJV renders this verse, “Anxiety in the heart of man causes depression….”
So the Bible indicates that having a bowed-down heart (which probably does mean depression) comes from other mental issues. There is no mention of any physical chemical imbalance being the cause of depression. (We could debate whether being depressed will CAUSE a chemical imbalance, which is a different matter altogether.)
However, if anxiety has led to depression, does it make sense that the BEST course of action is to take well-advertised pills with cute but weird names to manage “YOUR” depression? Wouldn’t it make more sense to learn not to be anxious, and thus depressed, in the first place by casting your cares on the Lord? Doesn’t it make more sense to look for a CURE for a mental illness rather than just treating its symptoms?
Today it seems like antidepressants are being given out like candy – to Christians as well as unbelievers. Have you ever seen so many ads for them? Yet it’s known that it can be dangerous to just stop taking them cold turkey once you’re on them. Why would that be? My guess would be because these drugs actually do alter the chemical balance in your brain. Once you get on them, you may indeed have a chemical imbalance. Why should your brain work to produce things that are now supplied in pill form without having to be manufactured internally?
I’m not purporting to be a doctor, but I challenge you to find in current medical literature anything that convincingly proves that the CAUSE of depression is a chemical imbalance. It will open your eyes if you start searching on this topic! What is being advertised and what is accepted as medical truth are very different. You’ll probably find what you could have figured out anyway – depression tends to be linked to having “depressing” things happen to you without knowing how to deal with them according to the Word. You would be hard-pressed to find someone living a wonderful life who just suddenly needs psych drugs because he suddenly developed a “chemical imbalance.”
You may occasionally hear a famous person share an “encouraging” word that goes like this: “Are you depressed? Well, that’s okay, because I suffer from depression, too.” I was once present at a concert where the artist shared this, and frankly it was a rather depressing concert! No one got healed or even saved that night. My primary emotion was wanting to leave, but I kept hanging around in the vain hope that things would get better toward the end, which they didn’t. I concluded that my free admission was overpriced, though I didn’t allow myself to get depressed over it.
So many Christians have fallen for the world’s low standard! They sound like those TV ads about how people manage “their” depression. (The first step to beating depression should be to quit claiming ownership of it every time you talk about it by calling it “your” depression. Healing is YOURS in Christ; the curse of depression is not.) They have come to believe that because they have a chemical imbalance or even a neurological defect that they were born with (which wasn’t their fault in that case), they will have to allow that awful condition to be their “constant companion” and just “manage” it or “cope with” it.
The WORLD tells you that mental illness is treatable but not curable. Actually, you could go to a Christian website and hear that, too. But the WORD tells you that with God, all things are possible (Matthew 19:26, Mark 10:27) and that with God, nothing shall be impossible (Luke 1:37). Many more Bible statements to the same effect may be found in the FIRST BASE section of The Baseball Diamond of Healing, so I don’t need to repeat them all here.
The Word further tells you that Jesus healed ALL manner of sickness and ALL manner of disease, which would include ALL manner of neurological issues, mental issues, chromosomal issues and any other kinds of issues! The Word tells you that God and Jesus have never changed and never will change (Malachi 3:6, James 1:17, Hebrews 13:8, Hebrews 1:12). So what was God’s will and Jesus’ will then still is Their will today – the complete healing of EVERY condition.
Some forms of depression even find their way into Deuteronomy 28:15-68, a passage that lists the horrible things we deserve if we do not keep the Law. Thank God, it is ALSO a list of things from which Christ redeemed us (Galatians 3:13)! Because depression is in there (wishing it were morning in the evening, wishing it were evening in the morning, having your life hang in doubt before you, being driven insane by what you see, etc.), it means that Christ HAS redeemed you from depression. Therefore, you have the right to receive YOUR healing for SATAN’S depression. (Satan is experienced in handing out depression – he has plenty of it to give. How depressed would YOU be if you knew that you would be tormented day and night in the lake of fire and that there was NOTHING you could ever do about it because Jesus only redeemed mankind, not fallen angels? Satan knows a thing or two about depression.)
The statement at the top of this section may be true from a NATURAL perspective. I do not question the premise that aside from supernatural help, certain conditions can only be treated but not cured. But you aren’t without supernatural help! I have known quite a few people whose NATURAL prognosis was a painful death from cancer or other fatal conditions, but whom Jesus healed! Jesus is not bound by doctors’ reports, and you should not be bound by them, either.
It is not helpful when well-meaning but immature Christians think that EVERY mental illness is caused by a demon that needs to be cast out. While mental institutions have plenty of demonized people, not everyone who has seizures or uncontrollable twitching needs to be delivered from a demon! It probably makes things a lot worse for such people when the “Christian” response is to cast a demon out that isn’t there. As a pastor, I’ve had to stop people from casting out spirits that weren’t there, as leaving the situation alone could have really hurt the person who was being “ministered” to. We saw a man who was catatonic set free and able to function in society – without ever casting a demon out of him. So be careful about that if you’re ministering to the mentally ill. On the other hand, when I visited a psych ward once it was kind of a giveaway when a woman suddenly said in a low voice, “You can’t cast me out! You don’t have enough experience!” I was somewhere else where in the same room as the person we were ministering to, there was a woman in another bed who didn’t seem to be able to talk at all, but when we started praying in the Holy Spirit, she suddenly started yelling at those of us who came, “Take your religion and get out of here!” You may have such experiences too – don’t “freak out” if they happen. Jesus did not “freak out” when demons manifested – He knew His authority and kept His cool, and so should you. The demonized boy was foaming, and Jesus was just having a nice calm conversation with the father, asking him “How long has he been this way?”
And you should not insult the mentally ill with the attitude or overt words, “What’s wrong with you? You should be in faith for healing!” Unless, of course, you’d like it if other people say that to you the next time one of the devil’s cheap colds gets on you. People need to be encouraged, not torn down.
Now there ARE mentally ill people who play the victim card and say, “It’s my chemical imbalance and it has nothing to do with anything I do” when all they’ve done is listen to depressing things all day. I majored in TV and radio broadcasting in college and we were taught the maxim, “If it bleeds, it leads.” In other words, the most horrific story should go on first to get the maximum ratings for the newscast. I don’t think things have changed since then. But if all you dwell on is negativity, you’re doing to become negative and then possibly depressed.
That’s one reason why the Bible admonishes us to think on GOOD things, not BAD things (Philippians 4:8).
It shocks me how many Christians today are on antidepressants, but it probably should not shock me given the depressing version of the gospel most of them are hearing – how they are undeserving, unworthy little worms, that God is mad at them for their sin, that they’d better “fess up” or they won’t be forgiven, and so on. They aren’t hearing anything that will do something for them that the best medical professionals can’t do for them. Most of them are never told from the pulpit that God wants them healthy and that He sent His Son to pay the price so that they can receive their healing right now.
If you already deal with a mental illness, the important thing is to look to your Solution. There were plenty of people in the Bible, including some heroes of faith, who battled despondency and despair at one time or another. David did (his soul was “cast down” – Psalm 42:5-6, Psalm 42:11, Psalm 43:5). Elijah did (he got so “down” soon after a great victory that he wanted to just die – 1 Kings 19:4). Even the great apostle Paul said that in Asia he was pressed out of measure, above strength, and he despaired even of life (2 Corinthians 1:8-10). But those Bible heroes didn’t STAY cast down, and you don’t have to, either. They looked to God, and that is what you must do. He was THEIR Healer and He wants to manifest Himself as YOUR Healer, too. In David and Paul’s case, the CURE was pointed to – hope and trust in God. Also, these Bible heroes did not go on and on suffering from depression as people think of it today. They were just really “down” at certain points, but it never turned into a depressed lifestyle.
You may think, “Well, those were some tough circumstances, but ‘my’ depression is due to a chemical imbalance so it’s worse than what they dealt with.” Even if that’s true (and I’m NOT agreeing with you that it is), the same God who lifted them out of despondency is the same God who is willing and able to do it for you. If it were really were a physical issue, you would have the right to receive the paid-for healing for that physical issue anyway.
Meanwhile, there is no condemnation for you from God (and there should be no condemnation from fellow Christians) if you take antidepressants for now. There are plenty of Christians who use cough drops if they have a cough. If they can get natural medical help, so can you. But there is healing available for the depressed as well as those who have colds and flus. At this point, natural medical help doesn’t cure any of those conditions; it just alleviates symptoms. You should continue with any prescribed medication until your doctor certifies your healing, but don’t “turn off the switch of faith” just because you are still taking medicine.
When I saw a certain pastor post on Facebook, “Remember, mental illness is real,” I commented, “Remember, Jesus’ ability to HEAL mental illness is real.” We can get way too caught up in the world’s attitude toward mental illness and forget that Jesus is the HEALER of mental illness! That healing is part of the New Covenant and it belongs to you.
They key point is that you must look to what the Bible says, not what the clinical “experts” say. You can get so caught up in the mechanics of how a certain illness works that you forget that God can overrule ALL those mechanics. For example, you could think, “This is a chromosomal issue; God would have to change zillions of DNA strands in my body to cure me.” SO? Is God unable to do that? The Scriptures referenced above prove that He is well able to do that and more. Rather than dwell on medical textbooks that will keep concluding, “Nothing can be done. Learn to cope with it and treat the condition with prescription drugs,” dwell on the Word that tells you that Jesus is the same today as He was when He healed ALL conditions that He encountered, which would include chromosomal issues, neurological issues, chemical imbalances (if they were ever actually the problem) and everything else!