![]() ![]() In a case like this (and this isn’t true for all situations), exhortations do nothing more than throw people back on themselves and their own resources. strengthen their faith) obscures the very thing that could strengthen their faith. The very act of trying to get them to do what is good for them (i.e. So your exhortation adds to the litany of failures that is usually part of the ‘self-talk’ of someone who is overcome by anxiety or depression.Įxhortations hide the solution. The person can’t do it, but already think they should. All that the person has is currently being used just to keep breathing.Įxhortations make the problem worse. What looks to you like defeatism is, in fact, simply weakness. There’s nothing in the tank, there’s no willpower to exert, there’s no courage to screw up so that they can just ‘get over it’. ![]() When someone is really downcast, exhortations are a waste of time. ![]() You have given him one more thing-and it’s a critical thing at that-to whip himself with as he judges himself to not be trusting God. You have essentially made brick from that straw and hurled it onto the load. He is barely standing up under the weight of just being himself.īut add an exhortation to do something to that load-especially one like “trust God”-and you have far more than a single straw to break the camel’s back. He is overwhelmed with burdens that seem silly to anyone not him, but to him, they are the fixed compass of his universe. The problem? His world is little more than darkness without any reasonable possibility of improvement. They can’t avoid exhorting him to stir up his faith, however “softly, softly” they venture it. And in their care, they inevitably call on him to trust God, to look to God, to place himself in God’s hands or the like. The thing that surprised me when talking to him recently is that as he begins the process of recovering from a depressive/anxiety breakdown, he has had to avoid his Christian friends and family. That, combined with some bad Christian teaching and an inherent susceptibility, has finally created a perfect storm of mental ill health. He’s a believer, who has had a harder-than-average road to walk. I have been talking with a long-term friend of mine in recent weeks. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |