The Depression Chronicles, Part 2

by Evan Wicker

To tell you the truth, I have been hiding for the past 5 years. Withdrawal. Isolation. Self-sabotage. Come to find out, these are apparently symptoms of depression. One of my greatest regrets in life is how I let this affect those closest to me, my friends and my family. Anyone who has lived with someone with mental health issues can attest to this fact. We unwittingly push others away in an attempt to hide ourselves from the world, and those closest to us suffer the consequences. In our warped thinking and self-loathing, we think we are doing others a favor. In my worst episodes of downward-spiral thinking, my own thoughts will betray me. This is precisely what makes mental illness so difficult: it prevents one from doing the very thing that could save them–reaching out. 

The late author David Foster Wallace explored this idea about depression and addiction in some of his writings. He called depression the “Bad Thing”. He writes: 

“Because the Bad Thing [depression] not only attacks you and makes you feel bad and puts you out of commission, it especially attacks and makes you feel bad and puts out of  commission precisely those things that are necessary in order for you to fight the Bad Thing, to maybe get better, to stay alive…The way to fight against or get away from the Bad Thing is clearly just to think differently, to reason and argue with yourself. Just to change the way you’re perceiving and sensing and processing stuff. But you need your mind to do this, your brain cells with their atoms and your mental powers and all that, your self. And that’s exactly what the Bad Thing has made too sick to work right.”

Wallace is pointing out something crucial, I think, not just about depression, but about the human condition. I have come to learn, all too well through my own sin and struggles, the contradictory nature of humanity in its ability to self-sabotage. It is no surprise, then, that the Bible is spot on regarding this human tendency: “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do (Rom. 7:15).” There is no verse, I think, more empirically true to human experience than Romans 7! If we are honest with ourselves, we can relate all too well to this fact: human nature is a bundle of contradictions. Our tendency to fail to do the good we know we must do goes much deeper than any psychological problem. Paul says it is “sin living in me”. 

We have a core problem as human beings, and it has to do with what the Bible calls “sin”. Sin is one of those Christian words which we tend to assume we know what it is, but I don’t think many of us truly understand its depths. Sin is our failure to live in obedience to God’s Law. Paul makes this connection in Romans 7 with an acute example: “I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, ‘You shall not covet.’ But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting (7:7b-8).” 

Paul says that our problem is not God’s law, but the sin living in all of us. This sinful nature is characterized by a desire to do the opposite of what God commands. It is a nature we are born with (Eph 2:3) and it betrays all that is righteous and holy. It is a nature with which we must contend, even after we put our faith in Christ. Paul confirms that there is a war waging inside of us, “So I find this principle at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of sin at work within me (Rom. 7:21-23).” Elsewhere, Paul called this inner conflict the war between the “flesh”, our sinful nature, and His “Spirit”, which indwells all believers. These natures are in conflict, and it is the reason, Paul says, we do the things we know we shouldn’t! 

After Paul explains our inward conflict, he cries out in desperation, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom 7:24-25)!” Without getting bogged down into further exegesis, Paul is pointing out something about our hope that is lost on many people, particularly in our American context of self–made millionaires and those who think the Bible says “God helps those who help themselves.” He is going into great detail about our continuing battle with sin because the problem cannot be solved by us–the problem is us. 

We need a rescue, an objective source of salvation outside of ourselves. This is what, I think, makes the gospel so truly amazing. Jesus Christ, by his death and resurrection on our behalf, offers the only lifeline capable of saving us from ourselves. This lifeline can be seen as nothing short of total and complete saving. Yet, many today hear the gospel not as an objective hope, but a subjective experience. Many hear Christ’s offer of eternal life and immediately ask like the rich man, “What must I do?” We err as preachers of the gospel when our response involves man’s effort to meet God halfway. We do disservice to the gospel if we tell a sinner anything other than “fix your eyes on Jesus”. When we point others to look further inward for their rescue, it is more like giving swimming lessons to a drowning person. We need something–someone–outside of ourselves to bring hope! It is our human tendency to think that there is something we must accomplish and atone in order to receive salvation (which is rooted in the fact that sin must be atoned if God is just). But as the great reformer Martin Luther said, “The only thing we can contribute to our salvation is the sin that made it necessary.” This is why we can say with full assurance like Paul: thanks be to Christ Jesus our Lord! He saves you and me utterly and completely, once and for all, no matter what I have done or will do. As my favorite theologian Michael Horton says, anything less will never be good news, only good advice. And, boy, do we truly need good news.