What Does the Bible Say About Mental Illness? Part 3

For over a decade I lived thinking I suffered internal anguish because I just didn’t have enough faith in the power of prayer. However, in 2009 I sank into a deep depression and finally got to a breaking point. I was working with high school girls through CRU, formerly Campus Crusade for Christ–an international ministry focused on evangelism and discipleship. My director sat down with me and kindly explained that I was in no state to be mentoring young women. I needed to step away from field ministry and seek healing.

He was right. And for the first time I was broken enough to face myself and accept help. I was desperate.

It was the end of the school year and I was scheduled to spend the summer taking seminary classes with fellow staff members followed by the biannual all-staff conference. Two women were appointed to come alongside me in my darkness over that summer. As the summer went on I was encouraged to seek medical help and to find a Christian counselor.

After years of struggle, I finally found my way out of my depression and reconciled my brokenness before the Lord. I was freed from thinking I needed to be the perfect Christian to be happy and drew closer to the Lord.

In Part 1 of this series I discussed what the Bible says about illness and how mental illness plays into that, pointing to King David and Job as examples. Part 2 covers the distinction between mental health and mental illness, explaining how the Bible uses the word “anxiety” as an example. Here I will explore how to give and get help for mental illness.

What Does the Bible Say About Mental Illness? Part 2

“You are a success!” my psychiatrist exclaimed. “You are a success and I don’t see that very often.”

My mental health hasn’t been this good in a very long time. Apparently this is uncommon for a manic-depressive compounded with an anxiety disorder.

“Mental health” is a common phrase used in our society. Like our physical health and spiritual health, our mental health is an important aspect of our well-being. However, a distinction should be made between “mental health,” and “mental illness.” Caring for our mental health is not the same as treating a mental illness. Caring for our mental health includes things like getting enough sleep, taking breaks throughout your day, and surrounding yourself with a supportive community. Caring for a mental illness means having a psychiatrist to prescribe and monitor your medication, meeting with a therapist, and having positive coping strategies.

Bipolar, or manic-depression, is a complex illness requiring multiple medications. Lithium, the most prescribed drug for my illness, presented severe side effects. I asked to be taken off of Lithium. While many psychiatrists wouldn’t consider this, I was so thankful that she listened to me and found an alternative. After many months, we found the right combination and dosages of medication and I have my life back.

In Part 1, I suggested King David and Job may have had circumstantial mental illnesses. For other people, mental illness is a chronic condition. The Bible, while not specifically naming mental illnesses, does provide circumstantial evidence of mental illness based on literal translations of the Greek and Hebrew vocabulary. We know that Jesus welcomed all and healed all who came to him. Including the mentally ill.

Now we’re going to talk about the difference between “mental health” and “mental illness.”

What Does the Bible Say About Mental Illness? Part 1

Nothing.

The Bible says nothing about mental illness. It also says nothing about cancer. Or heart disease. Or alzheimers. The Bible rarely calls out specific illnesses. Death from illness is mentioned, but not the cause.

Back then, people didn’t know what we now know about illnesses because they didn’t have the technological advances we have today. In fact, we’re still discovering “new” illnesses and causes of illness.

Why does it even matter what illnesses are in the Bible? For example, what illnesses does Jesus heal? Illness is illness and Jesus performed countless miracles and healed so many. Imagine hundreds of people gathered around Jesus waiting for their chance to be healed! I can’t even begin to envision what that was like. One third of Jesus’ ministry was healing, so it matters greatly that Jesus healed, but it matters little what he was healing.

Social Anxiety in a Pandemic

I walked into the grocery store with a bare face. I felt everyone staring at me as I searched for other maskless people to make sure I wasn’t the only one. I was surprised at the relief I felt to be rid of my mask, but also self-conscious after being required to wear one for over a year.

Being fully vaccinated and the mask mandate lifted, I am no longer required to wear a mask in most places. Freedom. There is nothing political in my viewpoint about masks. This is about my social anxiety disorder.

Anxiety Triggers

I’m in it. My chest is caving in on my lungs. My head is spinning. Every time I close my eyes I see the gruesome sight and then my mind rushes into a fury of terror. My blood rushes hot through my body. My breathing becomes rapid. Then chills run down my arms like lizards running across sidewalks on a muggy Florida afternoon. It’s summer and I’m sitting here with a sweater on.

What is a “Sunday Christian”?

In my testimony I use the term “Sunday Christians” when talking about my childhood. When my mom read that, she didn’t know what to think about it. Was this a negative thing? We ended up having a good discussion on how we grew up and evolved as a family in our spiritual growth. Do I think being a “Sunday Christian” is bad? No, I do not. Here’s how I see it.

Created for Community

Jesus lived in community. He surrounded himself with the twelve disciples and many others, such as Lazerus, Mary and Martha, and Mary Magdalene, just to name a few that come to mind. Sure, he was their rabbi, their leader. But he needed them, too. They assisted him in his ministry (Luke 9:1-6). They gathered with him for the last supper (Luke 22:14). They were with him in the Garden of Gethsemane where he prayed in distress (Matthew 36-38).

Jesus lived in community because God made us for community. He made us to bear one another’s burdens – to support one another in our trials and to restore each other when we falter (Galatians 6:1-10). He made us to serve Him through loving and supporting our neighbors (Matthew 22:37-40).

Part of loving one another is by walking alongside each other through the good times and bad. We need to surround ourselves with like minded individuals in order to walk this out.

When Christian Leaders Sin

The church we used to attend has been through a lot. Several years ago there was a scandal after a pastor admitted to having an affair with another staff member. It was a difficult thing for this large church to navigate. It was plastered all over the news. A few months later that pastor committed suicide which, as you can imagine, made things worse. This is not the first time something like this has happened in a church and, sadly, it won’t be the last.

The Medication Paradox

“Boing, boing, boing!” rings the alarm on my phone.

“Mom, it’s time to take your meds!” my four-year-old exclaims.

That specific ringtone chosen as my medication reminder has forever ingrained in our minds the utter importance of my taking my medication. On time. Because we all know what happens if I don’t.

I Have Overcome

My legs were wobbling as I walked towards my vendor table. Due to the event my schedule was different that day and I had time between dropping my son off at school and my work event. I decided to go for a walk. The walk turned into a run. It had been a decade since I last went for a run. Why now?

Self Image: Body, Mind & Spirit

Lithium. The most prescribed medication for Bipolar Disorder and yet it seemed to make things worse. My moods were still out of control. I was mean. I was severely lethargic to the point that I shouldn’t have been driving, but I was manic, so I did anyway. I gained weight and developed cystic acne. Why is a drug that is supposed to make me well again making me feel worse?

Then there’s my deeply scarred abdomen. I couldn’t think any worse about myself. And I pleaded the expected, “Why God?” And He was silent. Or at least I thought.

My body had failed me.
My mind had failed me.
My spirit had failed me.

The Storm Within My Mind

The rains come down from heaven and
Purify my soul
But a storm builds within my mind and has
Nowhere to go

Encased in heavy armor that leaks but
Won’t give in
My encapsulated mind is entangled
With confusion

My mind battles against the Savior that
Lives within my soul

Survival Mode

I walked down the stairs carrying my sleepy 21 month old son. My foot hit the tile at the bottom and all the synapses in my body rushed to compute what was happening. The cold wet puddle of water surrounding me triggered a moment of panic. I set my son on the couch and ran back upstairs for an armful of towels. I called my in-laws again. My mother-in-law came right over. The plumber was called.

It was the Monday after Thanksgiving, 2018. I had just proudly served my first Thanksgiving dinner. I was living my dream as a stay-at-home mom while nannying. It was a good arrangement. My good friend and her husband lived 5 minutes away. He worked at our shop and I babysat the kids. My life was finally going in a good direction after my near death postpartum experience the year before. Things do get better. You will get through this.

Oh my was I wrong.

Beautifully Broken

Bruised and broken
My sanity stolen
Satan looms
Darkness glooms
Sin from the garden
Ladens me with burden
Tears weep upon
The seed Christ has sown
Resurrection blooms
Beauty resumed

A dear departed friend of mine once told me that my brokenness was beautiful. I was in the midst of a serious depressive episode during a summer spent taking seminary classes through Cru. She, among others, walked with me through this brokenness. They ministered to my deeply troubled soul. The words “brokenness” and “beautiful” didn’t seem to have any business being in the same sentence. How can something so severely broken be beautiful?

When Prayer Isn’t Enough

Screams escaped me like a steaming kettle. There was no way to turn down the burner, no hand to pull it off of the heat. My mom was at a loss as to how to help me. She showed me my face in a mirror but I didn’t recognize that girl. For the longest time I thought she did this to show me how bad I was being. Now I realize that she was trying to show me how broken I was. She was showing me how badly I needed help. I looked at the mirror and wondered who that broken helpless girl was.

Fighting Anger

Our society is currently filled with a lot of anger due to a conglomeration of current events.

Politics.

Pandemic.

Social injustice.

And so many other things.

Anger seeps into conversation like the serpent snuck into the garden of Eden. Anger destroys relationships. Anger destroys people.

Momma’s Boy

The grayish squirming baby squenched his little face as he was quickly thrust onto my chest. Slippery from my bath water I clung to his tiny squirming body as he let out a little squelch. It was a beautiful perfect delivery which is vividly painted in my mind.

“Hi baby!” I gasped, overwhelmed.

“Call him by his name,” my midwife instructed.

The words seemed strange as I forced out, “Hey Arthur! Hello there!” to this little stranger laying in my arms. I felt the same the first time I called him my son to someone. It was like, now that he was outside of me, I had to get to know him all over again.

The Mind of Anxiety

The other day I started a fire in my house. I simply just wasn’t thinking.

I have some cast iron skillets that I take great care of because I just love cooking and I love cooking in them over anything else. I had recently reseasoned them (a process of baking oil onto the metal for a non-stick surface) and was determined to continue building on that seasoning, thus making them better, by taking care in how I wash and store them.

Well, I set the pan on the burner in order to dry it out, lest it rust. I figured high heat would dry it faster. I walked away for a few minutes and it had gotten too hot and the seasoning I worked so hard on was burning off. I panicked and immediately threw some vegetable oil on while it was piping hot. Needless to say, carbon started forming and it was smoking badly, telling me that a fire was about to start. I panicked more and grabbed the pan to run it under water. The movement of the oil caused it to burst into flames! The water was running but the flames just kept getting bigger.

Called to be Steadfast

I don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions. I’m of the mind that if there is something you need to improve in your life, you address it now. Putting off what you know needs to happen doesn’t serve you in the time you are waiting for the clock to click midnight on a specific date. Why put it off until tomorrow what you can start today?

For Better, For Worse

For better, for worse,

For richer, for poorer,

In sickness and in health,

To love and to cherish,

Till death do us part…

As we said our vows on December 30th, 2011, we meant it. It’s idyllic. We had typical newlywed expectations that, over time, changed as reality set in. It’s one thing to say the vows, it’s another thing to live them. I can see why so many people say those vows and don’t follow through. Marriage is a wonderful union, but it’s also very hard. We’ve lived too long in the “worse,” the “poorer,” the “sickness.” So many times the weight of carrying these vows strained our relationship. The important part? As heavy as they might get, we still carried them. And I would rather struggle with these vows with Andrew over anyone else.

Running From My Idol

My lungs drink in the cold November morning. Heart pumping fuel to my expanding and contracting muscles as endorphins and adrenaline surge through my body. My mind is focused on the power surging through my limbs and my eyes are targeted on the runners before me. Coach shouts out my mile split. “Way to go, Beth!” Encouraged at the news, I dig in deeper, stretching my legs across the grassy course.

A personal record under my belt, an All-State title, and another shiny token of success laying across my chest. I revel in the glory.

Conflict Un-resolution – Part 2: The Lesson

This is a story about a situation that went really wrong with a friend and employee. If you haven’t read part 1, please read that first. In part 2 I will bring you through the conflict resolution process we followed and what came of it.

The Un-resolution

The Bible is very clear with step-by-step instructions on how to deal with conflict within the Christian community. We took this very seriously and made sure to heed His word through prayer and deed.

The following steps need to be done in order, otherwise only gossip will prevail.

Conflict Un-Resolution – Part 1: The Fall

The Rise

A good friend. A loving church community. So many memories shared. Like all good friendships, as time went on, the relationship bond grew stronger. This is a habit I get myself into. Again. And again.

Some people have lots and lots of friends but don’t get particularly close to any one friend. Just a good group of community. This works for some people. I’m the kind of friend that, when I make a friend, I’m all in. Unconditional. BFFs. Except that I’ve had a poor track record of keeping it that way. Sometimes I’m to blame for being too codependent. Other times I just get completely taken at no fault of my own. For better or worse, I trust too quickly and too deeply. The latter friendship breakup is the hardest.

I’m learning how to not make excuses. Friendships die. The hard part is when that death of a relationship brings you down with it. Healing is possible, but it’s a journey only God can bring you through.

Hearing God

I sat in the pew feeling proud because my grandma was proud. It was a rite of passage in my family to be confirmed in the church. Just like the expectation to be baptized as an infant. Just like the expectation to take your first communion in second grade. Confirmation was what every good Lutheran kid did when they turned fourteen. After two years of boring dreaded catechism classes, I was finally becoming a member of the church.

The rote prayers and call and response rhythms subsided and the pastor did something unusual. He pulled up a chair and sat in front of the confirmands to deliver the sermon directly to us. However, my mind wandered to a different word of Truth.

The Battle Between Mental Illness and Physical Fitness

They say that exercise is important in maintaining mental health. Therefore, those with mental illness should be diligent about maintaining their physical fitness. As a former competitive runner and a graduate of a bachelor’s degree in physical education, I agree cognitively. However, as someone who has suffered severely from mental illness, I will tell you that being physically fit while mentally ill is a paradox.

In my deepest darkest days of mental illness (I’m talking about the pleading with God to end my life days. I’m talking about the, “I can’t take this anymore, how can I end my life?” days.) telling me to go out and be physically active was like telling me to just brush it off and buck up.