Treating Depression With the Power of God
The Christian website Family Life (2014) reports that roughly 25% of people deal with depression at some point. Maybe you are one of them right now. You feel hopeless, worn down, convinced that nothing will ever improve. If you also believe in a higher power, that belief itself may be part of what helps you climb out.
Research points in that direction. Studies suggest that faith in something greater than yourself can ease depressive symptoms, and that people who practice a religion tend to respond better to psychiatric care. The effect does not seem tied to one particular faith. Any belief in a higher power appears to do the work. One study looking at the link between patients' religious beliefs and their treatment results found that people with no religious affiliation were less likely to respond to treatment than those who believed in God or a comparable higher power. The researchers concluded that faith is connected to better outcomes for depression (Reilly, 2013).
The benefit reaches beyond mood. Faith in a higher power can also lower the risk of self-harm, including suicidal thoughts and cutting. Part of the reason is connection. When you believe in God, you are reminded that your life touches something larger than yourself, and that you are not carrying it alone. Even when your world feels like it is falling apart, that belief can hand you back a reason to keep moving.
Many faiths teach that hard seasons pass. The message is simple: things that feel permanent are not. The weight you are under today will, months from now, belong to the past.
Handing your troubles, your sickness, and your letdowns over to God can lift some of the pressure off your own shoulders. Prayer is one way to do that. In prayer you can say the things you would not say to anyone else, your worst fears and your darkest secrets, to someone stronger than you are. There is no judgment waiting on the other end, no risk of being pushed out for how you feel. In exchange, many people find their stress, depression, and anxiety loosening its grip, and sometimes their physical ailments too. A study on medical conditions and belief in a higher power found that patients who described a relationship with God healed faster, spent less time hospitalized, and saw real gains in both physical and mental health.
Belief also lets you stop trying to grip and steer every piece of your life, from your relationship to your money to your body. If you trust that God will handle what needs handling, you can loosen your hold and put your energy into getting well. Nothing looks quite as bleak when you believe someone else has the wheel and is driving toward what is best for you. Accepting that is not always easy. Faith is what carries people through the stretches where acceptance feels impossible.
Another thing most religions keep repeating: you are never alone, because God is always present. That one lands hardest in the worst moments. When someone you love dies, when the debt piles up, when illness or disability arrives, faith becomes a way to cope with what you cannot change.
Strong belief in something can do strange and remarkable things. There are documented accounts of people whose faith in a higher power coincided with cancer disappearing, and of couples struggling with infertility who finally conceived. Belief can also pull courage up out of you when you are in pain and ready to quit, and keep you upright anyway (Cahoon, 2008).
For someone who is depressed, faith can ease the symptoms by letting you glimpse the light at the far end of the tunnel. It gives you a companion when you are at your lowest. Open a religious text like the Bible and you find story after story of ordinary people finding strength and courage through their belief, lessons that transfer to almost any life. The Bible, the Koran, and other scriptures carry the same promise: you can live through terrible things. They read like support guides, nudging you toward the strength you already have. So the next time the low feeling settles in, notice what happens when you turn toward your own way of believing.
The beliefs that tend to lift a wounded heart are plain ones. God will not abandon you. God is always there. You are not alone. You are depressed now, but now is not forever. God stays beside you, holding your hand, reminding you that the Higher Power knows what it is doing. You might be surprised how different you feel after you pray. God hears you. God cares. Things may not land the way you hoped, but there is a reason behind what happens. Find your own way to believe in God. (Dr. R. Y. Langham)