Spiritual Depression Pt. 8: Feelings

OK, we're up to part eight of our series. And just a little bit of introduction. I like to start off with a quote from Martin Lloyd Jones, the author. He says, we are trying to diagnose and treat the case of the so-called miserable Christian.

We have been at pains to indicate that the very term, in and of itself, directs our attention to that which is so essentially wrong about the condition. I want you to pay close attention to what he's saying.

Notice what he's saying here, drawing attention to what is essentially wrong about the condition. He says, these words are really incompatible. And yet we must put them together because they are an accurate description of certain people.

Miserable Christian. It should be impossible, but actually it is a fact. There should not be such a thing, but there is such a thing. And it is our business, as we understand the teaching of the scriptures, both the Old Testament and the New, to deal with this condition.

That's how he opens this next chapter. Now, we've seen in the past chapters that this condition of spiritual depression is detrimental to the kingdom of God. It is a particularly effective tool of Satan.

And we've examined why. And here's another quotation. Whether we like it or not, the fact is that the world still judges God and the Lord Jesus Christ by what it sees in us. And we cannot blame them for that.

We make certain claims. The very designation of Christian, which we apply to ourselves, is a claim and a challenge. And the world is entitled to look at us. He then makes a very bold statement. And look at this.

There can be no question at all, and let us be clear about this, that the thing above everything else that accounts for the fact that the masses of the people are outside of the Christian church today is the condition of those of us who are inside the church.

Now, you may be able to argue with that, but I don't think you can argue that it's at least to some degree true. The biggest thing that is going to draw people into the church is the condition of the church itself.

He says revival always begins in the church. And the world outside seeing it begins to pay attention. That is why our condition as believers is so important. Now, that's the introduction to the next section.

Feelings as a Cause of Spiritual Depression

Section chapter eight is feelings. Feelings. Nothing more than feelings. Trying to forget. That's good. You know I had to do that. Okay. Getting down to the point. Perhaps there is nothing so frequently encountered as a cause of spiritual depression and unhappiness in the Christian life is as this very problem of feelings.

Okay. And here's what we mean. Now, that being said, we must understand that feelings and emotions are extremely important. All right. Especially in Reformed circles where we focus so much on doctrine, sometimes the feelings are not addressed as often as they should.

Remember, God has made us emotional beings. Emotions and feelings are not all bad. All right. Therefore, we must learn how to handle our feelings and our emotions correctly. There's the rub, as Shakespeare would say.

We must also take note that there is a relationship between this manifestation of spiritual depression and the previous chapters. All right. What I mean by that, those who are anxious about the past and or about the future, all right, have a tendency to be guided by their feelings.

Okay. And this is why it's so important. We must also note that once again, there are some people who are more naturally prone to this depression than others. And so some people are just more prone to rely on their feelings or be affected by their feelings than others.

And there's always the danger of, if you're not one of those people, it's sometimes it's hard to engender sympathy or understanding towards them. You say, well, just snap out of it, you know? And in fact, that was, what was it?

I think it was under the Reagan administration. They'd come up with this slogan, just say no to drugs. And then they were goofing on Reagan's economics and they said, just say no to poverty. All right.

And sometimes we have a tendency to go, well, just say no. I mean, you know, especially if it's not an issue that we ourselves have. So it's helpful to ask a series of questions or observe certain facts when trying to come to understand the role of feelings in our daily lives.

The Proper Role of Feelings in Salvation and Sanctification

First question is, what is the proper role of feelings and emotions? All right. As a Christian, feelings must be engaged. All right. Because the gospel engages the whole man. Remember, while we understand that man is made up of two basic parts, the inner man, the outer man, you know, we call it a dichotomy relationship.

All right. We also understand that the inner man has various aspects to it. The mind, the will, the emotions. And so salvation and sanctification engages the whole man. So therefore, while, remember what we talked about last week that salvation doesn't change your temperament or your personality.

It gives you the tools to deal with it biblically and to respond biblically. All right. That's the important part. And it's the same thing here. Our feelings, our emotions are God-given, but they can run amok just like the rest of us.

Because the gospel engages the total depravity which affects the whole man. Remember, this is why doctrine is so important. Who can tell me what total depravity is? What is total depravity? What do we mean by total depravity?

Every part of man is stained. Does it mean that man is as depraved as he possibly could be? No. See, and this is what we have to be careful of is make sure that we understand our terms. Total depravity means that every aspect of the personality of the individual, the mind, the will, the emotions, the body, every aspect of the human being is affected by sin and is under the curse of sin.

The gospel, the gospel message, the work of Jesus Christ reverses the depravity which affects the whole man. Therefore, we have the ability to control our emotions. Okay? So it's not just the mind or the will or the emotions that are sanctified, but the whole man is sanctified.

And when your mind reflects on what the gospel has done for you, how can you not respond emotionally? Think about that. If you are truly saved, then you understand what your destination was. You know what the future was in store for you.

And when you're saved and your mind is open and you see the gospel message and you realize that I was saved from the very pit of hell and I was done by our Savior who died on the cross and suffered all that agony until I was saved.

And I took the wrath of God upon himself that I deserve. How can you not be emotionally involved? So I mean, to say that we believe the truth is true and we're gonna discuss that a little bit more, but the truth will lead you to emotions.

In fact, if you remember when Jesus encountered those Samaritan woman by the well, and he talked about how we should worship, he says, in spirit and truth. And by the way, that spirit is a small S, it's not the Holy Spirit.

Not of course the Holy Spirit is involved in our worship, but that's not what he's saying there. In other words, there should be an enthusiasm which is guided by truth. When you understand the truth of the gospel, the whole inner man should be involved in that, your mind, your will, your emotions, okay?

Why Feelings Cannot Be Manufactured

Second statement, you cannot create emotions at will. Your emotions are not something that you can say, all right, I'm just going to be happy or I'm going to be sad. It doesn't work that way, all right?

You may be able to conjure up tears, all right? But that doesn't mean that they're real tears. You may be able to force yourself to laugh. Doesn't mean that you're really finding something funny or that you're even happy.

If those actions don't come from the soul being moved, they are false sentiments at best. And actors on the stage can bring forth great drama and romance often when they hate their co-star. This, I'll tell you, this is a true story.

Anybody see the old, it's an old story, an old movie from the 50s called Gentlemen Prefer Blondes? Or no, no, it's Some Like It Hot. I'm sorry, I think it was Some Like It Hot with Tony Curtis, Marilyn Monroe.

Tony Curtis and Marilyn Monroe were both sex symbols, all right, and they had the lead together. They hated each other. And yet they had to do romantic scenes. And after the movie was out, a reporter asked Tony Curtis, you know, how was it kissing Marilyn Monroe?

He said it was like kissing Hitler. Yet, if you see the movie, there's this big romance going on all right, you can be an actor. False emotions are a reality. All right, like kissing Hitler? All right, third statement, feelings are quite variable.

And physical conditions can actually affect our feelings. I mean, you know, your physical condition, you know, you can get hurt, you can be suffering a disease, and that can affect your emotional disposition.

So we need to understand these things. And they can change very often, all right. Nope, I'm not good. There's some great, no. Even though my wife's not here, I'm not gonna do it. Often after a great success comes great sorrow or even fear, all right.

Think of Elijah coming down from Mount Carmel. Remember, he's slaying 600 prophets of Baal and it's a mighty victory for the kingdom of God. And then what happens does he, what does he do soon as he's finished?

He comes down, he hears that Jezebel is after him and he flees and he's hiding and cowering in a cave. All right, from a mountaintop to the depths, fear and depressed. Martin Lloyd Jones says, yesterday you may have been perfectly happy and you went to sleep anticipating another great and glorious day but you find yourself in the morning waking up depressed and in a wrong mood.

We can be, we're very fickle in our emotional, our emotional status. Fourth statement, there's a subtle danger involved with feelings. And here's what I mean. Some people question their salvation because they didn't have a certain experience that's supposed to be or, experience or feeling.

All right, what I mean by that is they hear testimonies from those who have been dramatically saved from dire circumstances. And the bookstores, Christian bookstores are full of these books written by these testimonies.

Somebody coming out of organized crime, being saved and then dramatically they're saved and now they go into the Christian ministry. And there's one person in particular, which is interesting. And I hope, I'm dying to meet this guy.

It's Michael Franzese. I'll say it right out. Cause if Michael, if you ever should get this, I wanna meet you. The reason I wanna meet him is because I used to tail him when I was a cop. It's true. He was involved in drugs and he's even alluded to that in his book.

And I was one of the cops that was tailing him. So I would love to meet him now that we're brothers in Christ, you know. But people hear testimonies like that or somebody, a drug addict down on, you know, that right at the very depth and then God dramatically saving them in this great experience.

Well, some Christians say, I've never had an experience like that. I don't know what that feeling is like. You know, I've never been a real bad boy or a real bad girl, you know. And there's danger there.

All right. And since they didn't have similar feelings, they can actually doubt their salvation. There's also a part akin to this, is you have certain denominations saying that unless you experience certain things, you're not saved.

Okay. Some sort of second blessing and et cetera. And that's very, very dangerous. All right. And so you have people who would doubt their salvation because a lack of feeling or emotion. All right. And this is very common among those who grow up in Christian homes.

And never fell into grievous sin. You know, they say, I don't even know when I, the day I was saved. And that's a very real possibility. In fact, it's a common thing with kids who grow up in the church and in Christian households.

They say, I know I'm saved, but I just don't remember the exact day. And that's fine. So the fifth statement is there are some who deny the role of feelings in the life of the Christian. This is equally as dangerous.

You know, you have those who want their Christian walk to be guided by feelings, which as we see is extremely dangerous. And then you have those who deny the role of feelings. All right. Now, Martin Lloyd-Jones uses as an example, this excerpts of a sermon from one of the founders of the strict Baptists.

How would you like to be part of that? This is the first strict Baptist church of Suffolk County. Wow. That's as bad as, you know, being part of the ignorant brethren. And he warns of the danger of conjuring up false feelings among those who are truly saved.

All right. Which is a good thing. But he goes too far and we read this. The true child of God, he says, because he realizes the plague of his own heart and his own sinfulness, walks through this world heavily and laboriously, conscious of his sin and the greatness and the majesty of God.

This is going too far. This is too far. Is that the life that a Christian is doomed to? Walking through life, head bowed. Oh, I'm such a sinner. Oh, I'm such a sinner. You know, and just, you know, like Martin Luther, flagellating himself.

Okay. That's exactly where Martin Luther was before he was saved. Remember, one of the principles we've examined in the past, there must be balance in the life of the Christian, right? Yes, we need to always keep in mind that we are sinners.

And you may have been a grievous sinner in the past. And yes, we always have to keep in mind the majesty of God, but what should that lead us to? You must also be aware of the remedy of the gospel, which causes him to walk with joy in his heart.

We are not those who should be walking laboriously and heavy hearted once we have been saved, because we have been freed from bondage to sin. And we should be walking with joy in our heart. And that brings us then to the cure.

How to Deal with Guilt and Restore Joy

And first, make sure there's no obvious cause for the absence of joy. I mean, this is just really common sense. If you're feeling guilty, check to see if there's real guilt, all right? If there is, you don't have to look any further.

Guilt feelings are proper if there is real guilt. Just want to make a clarification here, because if you ever wind up talking to a Freudian, you understand the Freudian's goal as psychologist, Freudian psychologist goal is to rid people of guilt feelings, okay?

And you know how they do that? By getting rid of barriers. Oh, what you did, oh, that's not wrong. Oh, you killed that guy? He deserved it, it's not your problem. That's a little extreme, but that's the direction that they go in.

Throw off the fetters. You feel guilty because you've had sexual sin? Oh, well, what you need to understand is whatever you did, it's right. That's what they do, they throw off the fetters. And because they're trying to get rid of guilt feelings.

What happens in the role of the Christian? You get rid of the guilt. The guilt is real, but that guilt can be remedied by coming to Christ and through repentance, et cetera. If there's real guilt, acknowledge it before God, confess it and repent of it.

That's how you get rid of guilt feelings because you're getting rid of the true guilt. To get rid of the, getting rid of guilt feelings is like having the fire alarm go off and just silence the bell because it's annoying.

No, don't you want to find out why the fire alarm is going off in the first place? First John 1 .9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

That's the first. Second, don't let feelings become the central part of your life. Again, I don't want anybody to get the impression that I'm saying, don't ignore your feelings or don't acknowledge them.

No, I'm not saying that at all. What I'm saying is they can't be the central part of your life. If you're guided by your feelings and emotions, you will make mistakes. You can take that to the bank. Feelings are never meant to take the first place.

They are never meant to be central. If you put them there, you are of necessity doomed to be unhappy because you are not following the order that God himself has ordained. Okay, you're following what he's saying?

You're not following the order that God himself has ordained. We see it in his talking when Christ talks to the woman by the well, spirit and truth, spirit guided by truth, okay? And we're gonna get more.

Truth is primary in the scriptures, okay? After all, what we have in the Bible is truth. It is not an emotional stimulus. It is not something primarily concerned to give us a joyful experience. The Bible wasn't here to make one happy.

That's not its primary goal. That is a byproduct. It's to give us truth, okay? Truth is primary. Once you, when you're seeking truth, you will find happiness. And that's something that we need to make sure.

It's always having to do with truth. He says, I must never ask myself in the first instance, what do I feel about this? The first question is, do I believe it? Do I accept it? Has it gripped me? This is so important because again, if you try to, if you have sin on your heart and you have guilt feelings and that makes you unhappy, all right?

Trying to swing your emotions isn't gonna do it. You can't go to the scriptures and read something that's going to automatically make you feel better unless it's the truth, okay? The truth of scripture will affect how you feel.

If you read the scriptures, take the unsaved person who is feeling miserable in their sin, they read the scripture and find out that if I receive Christ as Savior, if I repent of my sin, I am free of that, of the guilt of that sin, then the emotions are gonna follow.

Yes, I can rejoice. Why? Because of truth. If you believe Christ has set you free, your feelings will follow. See, and many Christians spend too much time thinking about their feelings instead of the truth of God's word, all right?

The best thing you can do for somebody who is spiritually depressed is lead them to the truth of the gospel. Third point is to recognize there's a difference between rejoicing and feeling happy. Scripture tells us to rejoice always, Philippians 4 .4.

Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice, but notice what it says. Rejoice in the Lord. Not rejoice in your circumstances, but rejoice in the Lord. There's always joy in the Lord. Happiness is a result of your circumstances, but joy comes from the Lord.

If things are going my way and I'm doing well, I can be happy, all right? But then what happens when things start going the other way and I'm losing and I'm not, you know, things, I'm just, things are just falling apart.

I'm not going to be happy anymore, but I can still rejoice in the Lord. I can rejoice in the Lord because he tells me that as a believer in him, that everything that comes into my path is for my good and his glory, and it will work out for my good.

So I can still rejoice. I may not be happy, but I can still rejoice in the Lord, okay? Here's an example from the Apostle Paul. And I think this is a, these are perfect verses. The good doctor uses these, and I think they're perfect verses to show the difference between circumstances and rejoicing, okay?

Notice he says, we are afflicted in every way. Happy about that? Think Paul was saying, I'm happy, I'm afflicted. I doubt it. Paul was made of flesh just like this, but not crushed. Content, rejoicing.

He can rejoice. I'm afflicted, but I'm not crushed. Perplexed. Not happy about that. I hate to be perplexed, but not despairing. There's joy. Persecuted. Nobody likes to be persecuted, but not forsaken.

Struck down, not destroyed. And then always caring about the body of death, et cetera, et cetera. I want to go back to verse one of 2 Corinthians 4, because notice what set this whole thing up, the beginning of the chapter.

Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we receive mercy, we do not lose heart. That's his emotional status. Paul knows the truth, and he sets this up that showing the difference between happiness and rejoicing, and he says, but we don't lose heart.

His emotional condition is fine, okay? Now, the last point is to learn how to speak to yourself in a biblical way. And this is very important, and I'm going to show you a couple of things. I used to tell my geometry students at the school that if you walk around talking to yourself, people are going to think you're insane, okay?

Except if you're one of my geometry students. Because to solve problems, especially geometry problems, you have to talk to yourself. You have to ask yourself questions. All right, what is the question asking?

How am I going to do that? And you have to start and have this ability to talk to yourself and ask the right questions, okay? It's okay to talk to yourself if you're a Christian. In fact, you should be talking to yourself.

You should be talking to yourself as a Christian. I wouldn't suggest doing that walking down the street, because they will think you're insane, okay? Especially if you're answering yourself, okay? Lloyd-Jones, I have said this many times before, and I shall go on saying it, for there is a sense in which what the scriptures do is to teach us how to speak to ourselves.

See, I'm not the only one, okay? That happens when you remind yourself of biblical truth. Remember, we're under the section now of how are we going to come and resolve spiritual depression and especially that which is caused by an aberrant use of feelings, all right?

Ask yourself questions like this. Who am I in Jesus Christ? If you're spiritually depressed, remember going back to the beginning, the couple of the slides, the introductory slides, where he said, really, this should not be, you should not be able to say he's a miserable Christian.

Shouldn't be. Christian and miserable should not be compatible with each other, but it is. We do have Christians who are miserable. One of the cures is to start reminding yourself of biblical truth. Remember, focusing on the truth will affect the feelings.

If you focus on the feelings, you're not going to get to the truth. So it has to be in the right order. So ask yourself, who am I in Jesus Christ? And you can go on, and if you have trouble answering that, start going through the scriptures, all right?

The answer is not who you feel you are, but who the Bible says you are. Notice, the emotions are guided by the truth. This is what we saw in the psalm that we've used as a theme. Anybody remember, what psalm have we used?

I purposely didn't put it up at the beginning. Psalm 42, excellent. Look at Psalm 42, verses five and six, and now look at what the psalmist does. Why are you in despair, O my soul? What's he doing? He's talking to himself, okay?

And why have you become disturbed within me? He's obviously depressed, right? So we ask, why are you depressed? Why have you become disturbed? Why am I feeling? Why do I have these feelings inside me?

What does he do? Hope in God, for I shall again praise him. He's obviously reading the scriptures, all right? Because he finds out this is what biblical truth is, for the help of his presence. Hope in God, for I shall again praise him for the help in his presence.

He knows. Here's a person who is truly a believer because he's asked the questions and then the answer, he gives the answer because he knows what the scripture says. See why it's so important to have a devotional time and a Bible study time?

Because if you ask that question, why are you in despair, my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? If you don't know the answer biblically, you're not going to have the answer like he does.

He continues, oh my God, my soul is in despair within me. Therefore, I remember you from the land of the Jordan and the peaks of Hermon from Mount Mizar. Notice, what's he doing? The psalmist is saying, oh, something happened over by the Jordan.

You don't even have to know what it is. Something happened. He remembers the peaks of Hermon and from Mount Mizar, all right? You can do the same thing. You've been a Christian for any length of time, you go in despair, sit down and say, how has the Lord delivered me in the past?

Oh, I remember the time when X, Y, and Z happened and look how the Lord saved me from that. Look at how the Lord used that. Look how even when I was going through the pit of despair, he was with me, right?

Even though I walked through the valley of the shadow of death, he's with me, okay? That's one of the purposes. That's why this psalm is so perfect for this study. And he concludes with this thought. Do you want to know supreme joy?

Do you want to experience a happiness that eludes description? There is only one thing to do, really seek him. Seek him himself, turn to the Lord Jesus Christ himself. If you find that your feelings are depressed, do not sit down and commiserate with yourself.

Do not try to work something up, but this is the simple essence of it. Go directly to him and seek his face. In other words, when I say talk to yourself, I'm not saying have a pity party with yourself, but talk to you, ask yourself the questions and then go to the scriptures for the answer.

Questions.

Yes. Okay, so when you were talking about how the first question that you should ask is, do I believe it? Do I accept it? Has it gripped me? And then secondary, what do I feel about it? Is that in general when it comes to like spiritual depression, or would you say that that would be true in terms of making any type of decision?

No, it's yes to both of those. What I'm doing here is using general principles in a specific case, but a lot of these principles can apply to things other than to depression. For example, anytime you're caused, you have to make a decision, all right?

What the decision that you have to make has to be a godly one. So you need to understand the principles of scripture. So what do you do? You go to the scripture. And so you ask yourself the questions, all right?

This is the decision I have to make, all right? What does the scripture say about this? Is there a scriptural guideline for it? And if so, what is it? And how does that apply to my specific circumstance?

This idea of asking yourself questions is pretty much throughout your Christian life.

And I have a follow-up question that goes along with it. Okay. You're supposed to ask the secondary question of how do I feel about it, or what do I feel about it? Like what if you know that you believe it, but feelings don't also go along with it?

Well, yeah, if you're not having trouble with your feelings, then you don't even have to go there. If your feelings are proper for the circumstances that you're in, then they're not a problem. What we're talking about here is spiritual depression, where the feelings of a person has led them into a spiritual depression.

If that's not the issue, then you don't have to worry about it. And you can ask... I've only given a sample of a couple questions just to give you the idea, but there may be a whole list of questions.

Sometimes, however, one question is enough. So it depends.