Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. Ps. 43:5
Heavenly Father, we come to your throne of grace today on behalf of those who struggle with some degree of sadness—from mild melancholia to deep depression. Father of mercies—God of all comfort, teach us how to comfort our friends in the throws of dark feelings. Teach us how to steward our own stress unto distress.
Continue to free us from simplistic views of depression. David asked the right question in his season of duress: “Why, my soul, are you downcast?” (Ps. 43:5). Indeed, Father, help us understand the various reasons for a downcast, disturbed soul.
For friends whose depression is spiritually generated—the pain of living with no sense of the wonders of your love, the riches of your grace, and the peace of the gospel. Father, whether they are believers or not, draw them to yourself, in fresh, palpable and healing ways. Reveal Jesus as merciful, and mighty—full of compassion and kindness.
Father, for friends who suffer from depression generated by physiological reasons, lead them to the right kind of medical care and counsel. Give us wisdom and presence, grace and kindness to care for them.
We pray for friends who suffer from depression fueled by the lord of darkness, himself. His condemning, blaming, and shaming voice generates deep forms of despair. We are so thankful that He who is in us if greater than anyone or anything in the world. May the truth of the gospel sabotage the lies of our defeated, fury-filled foe (Rev. 12:12).
Father, lastly, help us steward our own “downcast-ness.” May our default mode of withdrawal and isolation, be replaced with running to you and collapsing on Jesus. With the Psalmist, we proclaim you to be our Savior and our God. Our hope is in you. So very Amen we pray, in Jesus’ compassionate and victorious name.
