Depression

2-24-2006

A warning from God: Watch your depression. Come to Me quickly. Let Me come into your heart to bring you peace. Don't let the depression destroy our communion by letting unbelief to go unchecked.

Hebrews 3:12-12 (NKJV) "Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called 'Today', lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin."

David Wilkerson says about this passage: "This passage warns us, 'Be on guard, and don't allow any unbelief to take root. At times the Lord may seem distant to you. But don't let your heart depart from the reality of His faithfulness."

Hebrews 3:14-19 (NKJV) "For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end while it is said 'Today if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.' For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed was it not all those who came out of Egypt, led by Moses? Now, with whom was He angry 40 years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief."

Let the Word discern the condition of your heart, whether you are in faith or not. Let God search your heart. Only He can give you the answers you need. Trust Him.

Hebrews 4:11-13 (NKJV) "Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. For the Word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give an account."

Hebrews Chapter 11, especially verse 1 (NKJV) "Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen."

And verse 6 (NKJV) "Without faith it is impossible to please Him. For he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him."

Habakkuk 2:4 (amplified) "Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; but the just shall live (everyday, conduct their lives) by His Faith (faithfulness, truth, firmness, steadiness, solid belief)."

Ephesians 4:23-24 (paraphrased) ...be renewed in the spirit of your mind. And put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.

Don't let your regrets depress you; forget them. They are past.

Philippians 3:13-14 (NKJV) "Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."

Lamentations 3:22-24 (NKJV) "Through the LORD's mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning! Great is Your Faithfulness! 'The LORD is my portion,' says my soul, 'Therefore I hope in Him!' "

Hebrews 2:1-4 (esp. vs. 3) (NKJV) "Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard lest we drift away. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and ever transgression and disobedience received a just reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the LORD and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him, God also bearing witness both with signs and wonders, with various miracles and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will?"

Do not return to your old ways which you now know are sin: cavalier attitude toward God and your relationship with Him. Unbelief in His faithfulness, unbelief in consequences of sin, unbelief in His love for you, thinking He does not care. Depression is unbelief. You have lost your fear of God. Do not ignore so great a salvation or the high price it was paid for.

Just because we have forgiveness of sins does not give us permission to keep on sinning. Jesus said, "Go, and sin no more."

Galatians 5:13 (paraphrased) For you have been called to liberty only do not use that liberty as an opportunity to sin.

Romans 7:24-8:2 (NKJV) "O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God - through Jesus Christ our LORD! So then, with the mind I serve the law of God, but with the flesh, the law of sin.
There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death."

1 Peter 5:10 (NKJV) "But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you."

Galatians 4:9 (paraphrased) But now that you know God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements (your life without Christ)? Do you desire to be in bondage to depression again?

Galatians 5:16 (paraphrased) Walk in the Spirit and you will not sin.

Colossians 2:13-15 (NKJV) "And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it."

Isaiah 43:1b-3a (NKJV) "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; you are Mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you. For I am the LORD your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior."

2 Corinthians 4:7-9 (NKJV) "But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed..."

Mark 9:24 (NKJV) "Lord, I believe, help my unbelief!" God respects pure honesty.

Ephesians 4:13-14 (KJV) "...till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine...."

Romans 12:3 (paraphrased) For I say to you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has given everyone the measure of faith.

Romans 12:1-2 (NKJV) "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God."

Romans 10:17 (NKJV) To transform your mind: "Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God."