Coming Out of the Shadows PT 4 – Navigating Depression with Faith-Friendly Tools

Depression silently shadows millions of lives, with over 21 million Americans experiencing major depression annually. Even more revealing is that approximately 7.6 million Christians battle this condition while often facing an additional burden of shame and spiritual confusion. These statistics aren't just numbers—they represent real people struggling to reconcile their faith with their mental health challenges.

Depression stretches far beyond temporary sadness or spiritual weakness. It's a complex mood disorder that can drain motivation, steal joy from activities once loved, and even disrupt your sense of connection with God. For Christians, this often creates a painful cycle where feelings of spiritual inadequacy compound the depression itself. The good news? You don't have to suffer alone, and there are numerous practical strategies to manage depression while honoring your faith journey.

Before reaching for medication (though it can be appropriate and lifesaving when needed), consider these faith-friendly approaches: morning walks that expose you to mood-enhancing sunlight, handwritten journaling that neurological research shows activates emotional processing in ways digital journaling cannot, challenging negative thinking patterns that distort God's truth, and setting small, achievable goals that rebuild confidence. Scripture repeatedly shows that even faithful servants experienced profound discouragement, yet they found hope through their darkest seasons.

Faith offers unique resources during depression: hope when circumstances seem hopeless, strength during times of weakness, a perspective that challenges distorted thinking, and a community when isolation feels safest. As you journey toward healing, remember that self-compassion isn't selfishness—it aligns with Jesus' command to "love thy neighbor as thyself." Whether through the practical tools shared in this episode, the resources on my blog, or my book "Getting a Grip on Depression," know that you can find your way back to joy and purpose. Depression may be part of your story, but with faith and evidence-based strategies, it doesn't have to define your future.

#Depressionbiblestudy, #christianbooksondepression, #depressionandfaith, # christiandeppresion,#christianmental health.

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Transcript

Introduction to Depression Series

Speaker 1 0:00

Resilient Solutions Shortcast. Episode 72, coming Out of the Shadows. Part 4, navigating Depression with Faith-Friendly Tools. Did you know that over 21 million Americans suffer with major depression at some time in their life, at least in the past year, according to a recent survey? Another alarming fact is that among this number, a significant number are Christians. As Dr Lynn Lance highlights, up to 7.6 millions of the Christian community may be silently battling this distressing reality of depression. While these statistics can be alarming, there are so many positive things we can do and we can help with people who struggle with depression, and today I'm going to give you some proven tools and tips that you can use to push back depression in your life.

Understanding Depression in Christians

Speaker 1 0:50

Hello, my name is John Thurman. I'm an author and a therapist and a speaker, and you're listening to John Thurman's Resilient Solutions Shortcast, where I help you become more resilient in your personal life, your relationships and in your faith. Thanks for joining me today. Why don't we jump right in? Hey, I want to thank you for joining me today of my four-part series inspired by my book Getting a Grip on Depression. In this post, we'll explore key insights into understanding depression. Additionally, I'll give you some ways that faith can help you deal with depression, and I'll also share with you 13 things that you can do to enhance your well-being and reveal how faith can enhance your recovery as you deal with depression. Once again, I'm so glad you joined me today. By the way, you can find all this on my blog. You'll also see some links to some other articles in that blog, as well as a link to my book, getting a Grip on Depression.

Speaker 1 1:48

Well, let's talk a little bit about understanding depression. When we're talking about depression, it's something that goes way beyond a season of sadness. It can evolve into a mood disorder that can feel overwhelming and persistent and often leads to reduced interest in activities you used to enjoy. It can steal your motivation, rob you of your feelings of intimacy with the Lord and produce a lot of shame and guilt. And if you're a believer and you're struggling with depression, you have that additional layer of shame and guilt because you have some mental issues going on, nothing to be ashamed of, and fortunately in the church we begin to talk about this a little bit more Now. If you are struggling with depression or you're feeling just an unusual sense of sadness, I want to give you some hope and encouragement. It's essential that you realize that you do not have to walk alone down this path. So many times, because of our Christian faith and because of some of the lies we believe and the shame a lot of people feel for dealing with mental health issues, many believers suffer in silence and suffer alone, and that just shouldn't be. The church should be a place of healing, love, respect and accountability.

13 Practical Tools to Combat Depression

Speaker 1 2:57

Well, let's talk a little bit about how to overcome depression. Once again, this is on the blog, but it's so important to realize that there are scores of things you can do before you have to think about medication, and what I hope we can do in this podcast is give you some tools and tips and strategies that you can use to manage depression. Of course, as a licensed mental health professional, if you need to be on medications, by all means consider it, but there's so much you can do before you take that step. Unfortunately, in our country today, with big pharmas constantly advertising medical solutions for nearly everything that you could deal with, so many people tend to default to medication first. As I said, medication, if it's appropriately prescribed and monitored, can be a lifesaver, but there's so much you can do before you have to go on the medication pathway, so let's give you 13 things you can do to overcome depression. Whether you're on meds or not, these are going to help.

Speaker 1 3:53

Number one get moving. One of the things that happens when you're depressed is your motivation is just in the toilet, so to speak. It feels like you're get up and go done, got up and went as we used to say. In the toilet, so to speak. It feels like your get up and go done, got up and went, as we used to say in the South. One of the absolute cheapest and easiest things to do is get up and move. Boost your mood by walking 10 or 15 minutes a day. You can do more than that, but start out with 10 or 15 minutes and if you are feeling depressed, the best time to do that is the morning. That way, you get that morning sunshine in your face. It activates some of your photoreceptors and gives you a natural mood boost.

Speaker 1 4:30

Number two eat balanced meals. Who does that these days, right? Well, we try to. Breakfast to me typically is a piece of toast and bacon, some eggs and maybe some salsa. Lunch, still working on that Dinner. We really try to do a balanced thing, but in America we are in such a hurry, in such a rush we eat so much processed food, so much food we buy on the go, and I understand it, because life is crazy sometimes. But I want to encourage you to look at fueling your body with nutritious food.

Speaker 1 5:05

Number three, number three, number three prioritize sleep. I know you may be having problems with sleep. Any night, on any network, you'll see all these advertisements for sleep aids. So let's just assume we Americans are not getting enough sleep. What we have to do if we want to maintain good, positive, strong mental health is work on getting quality rest.

Speaker 1 5:27

I've got an article you can link to called Rest Easy. Go to my blog and you'll see it. Sleep is so important. There's so many things you can do to help these days. One of the things that I use is a supplement developed by Doc Parsley. You can go to his website, doc Parsley, d-o-c. Parsley, p-a-r-s-l-e-y. Just like the herb, he's a former Navy SEAL who's come up with a compound. This natural supplements has really helped me sleep. I'm not an affiliate, I don't get any money out of this, but just Google Doc Parsley and you'll look for sleep remedy. I'll have a link in the show notes. It's really helped me. Sleep is so important, guys. I can't emphasize that enough.

Speaker 1 6:08

Number four journaling. This is another thing that I've believed and have done for years, and in 2018, 2019 timeframe there was some research by some neurologists on the impact of journaling and what they found out is, if you journal digitally, there's no real emotional benefit to that. They did a side-by-side study where they had one group that journaled with a keypad. The other group wrote their journal with a pen and paper or pencil and paper an old traditional way. What they found was fascinating the people that did their journaling on a keypad. There was no neuroactivity Zip, zero, nada. But with the people who hand wrote it, they actually were able to see in their brain scans that there was actual measurable brain activity when people hand wrote their journals down. What we think happens is when you're writing, you're using your cognitive processes and when you're writing and forming those letters, you're using those psychomotor skills and their premise is that when I'm thinking about these things and writing them down, I'm actually able to touch the emotional process. However, if things get too intense, I can simply put my pencil down. So you might want to think about journaling.

Speaker 1 7:25

Number five you want to challenge your negative thinking. One of the things I write about in my book Getting a Grip on Depression, is there are six or seven common stinking thinking themes that people tend to go to. It seems to be that nearly everybody that's depressed struggles or uses two or three of these. More about that in another podcast or in my book. But just to let you know that we need to challenge our negative thoughts. We need to evaluate their validity and adjust your perceptions. There's a great book I'm reading right now called you Are Not your Brain Excellent book by a Christian psychiatrist on how to knock down those negative thoughts.

Speaker 1 8:03

Number six stop ruminating. Redirect your focus to positive things when you're confronted with negative memories. So many times I try to tell clients you are not your trauma. I'm so sad bad things happened to you, but if you only focus on that, you let the perpetrator win. You need to learn to stop ruminating, stop replaying those negative memories, and there are some great tools you can use. There's some links to some on my website, but also there's a book that came out by John Acuff a few years ago called Soundtrack. I've had a number of my clients use it and they actually love the book. I've got links to my review of the book as well as a link to the book in my blog.

Speaker 1 8:46

Number six set small goals. Remember what about Bob? Some of you do, and it's baby steps, baby steps, baby steps. When you're feeling depressed, nearly everything feels overwhelming. How do I know that? I've studied it and I had to deal with my own battle with depression. It tied in with some PTSD from years ago. What you want to do is take those baby steps. Break down tasks into manageable little bites and as you eat those little bites, you'll overcome whatever that setback is. Number eight get off your tail and do something. Take action, get engaged, move forward, engage in minor actions to cultivate a sense of empowerment. Once again, if you're clinically depressed, you're just like eh, whatever, I want to tell you that one of the key things you can do is to take some action, take some baby steps. Number nine avoid. Avoid. Avoid making big decisions. Postpone significant decisions when you're feeling overwhelmed, because the results is never good when you do that.

Speaker 1 9:52

Number 10, enjoy life. I know when that dark cloud rolls over you, you feel like, like I said earlier, you're get up and go. Done, got up and went. Or, as one of my friends in East Tennessee used to say, when you're depressed, you feel lower than a pregnant aunt. Think about that for a minute. Lower than a pregnant aunt. That is pretty low, isn't it? Even in those days when you're in that pit of depression, you can choose to enjoy life. You can choose to praise the Lord, you can choose whether you feel like it or not to make some choices to smell the coffee, smell the roses, play with your cat or dog. I know from experience that that can be hard to do when you feel depressed, but let me encourage you to do it.

Speaker 1 10:33

Number 11, stay connected. One of the biggest things that people do when they're feeling depressed is they isolate and withdraw. They withdraw emotionally, they withdraw physically and many times they withdraw spiritually. So just be aware of that. Stay connected. That's one of the healthiest things you can do.

Speaker 1 10:52

Number 12, practice self-compassion. Sometimes I get feedback from Christians going well, that's self-love, that's selfish. No, it isn't. As a matter of fact, if you read Jesus' own words when he's discussing the great commandment, the greatest commandment is thou shall love the Lord, thy God, with all thy heart, soul and mind and catch this. Love thy neighbor as thyself, how's your self-love? Doing this doesn't mean some nihilistic, selfish way, but respecting your temple, the temple that the Lord made, which is your body Number 13,.

How Faith Guides Through Depression

Speaker 1 11:25

Get my book Getting a Grip on Depression. It's an easy to read book. It has a lot of information about types of depression, it has stories of real people and it gives you some great Bible studies that you can do yourself to help you improve and understand depression Not only understand depression, but to help you just to get feeling better and get back in step with God's plan for your life. Now, if you're finding your depression is something that's persistent, you're experiencing self-harming thoughts. It's crucial to seek help immediately. Experiencing self-harming thoughts it's crucial to seek help immediately. If you need help, call your physician, call your doctor, call your local crisis line. You can even call the national hotline 988 and get help. Do that, don't delay. Well, let's look at a couple more things real quick as you wrap up. Today I'm going a little bit long, but that's all right.

Speaker 1 12:14

How does faith guide us when we're depressed? Well, I believe it guides us in five ways. First of all, in the midst of depression you see this time and time again in the Old Testament it provides hope. You see, even in the midst of those stinky bad days, faith can foster a sense of hope and trust that things will eventually improve. The second thing it does is faith fosters inner strength and resilience, even in the midst of those dark days.

Speaker 1 12:43

Number three faith encourages positive thinking. Now I'm not talking in the secular sense, but I'm talking positive mental thinking from the standpoint of that. Jesus said he would never leave us nor forsake us. The fact that the church, the body, is a resource for you. There are people that can help. The biggest thing there is to maintain your hope Even though it's looking bad, find ways to look towards the future. Scriptures give a story after story of that. Christian radio, christian podcasts like mine give stories and encouragement and hope to people who are feeling down.

Final Thoughts and Call to Action

Speaker 1 13:18

Number four be sure that you're offering in comfort and peace to others. I know this sounds a little bit weird, but when you're depressed you tend to isolate, you tend to turn in, and one of the best things that you can begin to do to feel better is to help someone else. It may be a neighbor, it may be an older person in the grocery store, but just offer encouragement and help to others. And what happens with our faith? That faith gives us comfort and peace through the scriptures and through stories. And then the fifth one and the fifth way that faith guides us through depression is promoting connection. The scripture is filled with stories of connecting and, even though we're more connected than we ever have been through our devices, research tells us time and time again that we are experiencing an epidemic of loneliness, and one of the places that you can find support and encouragement is at a local Bible-believing church and through corporate worship and being intentionally connected to others. Well, wow, we've covered a lot today.

Speaker 1 14:16

This is the final session. If you like what you heard, let me know, leave me a comment in the notes. I've got some calls to action for you. If you'd like to go deeper, get in my book Getting a Rip on Depression. Also, if you go to my blog, you'll see a number of links to resources that you can download or read. Some are podcasts, some are PDFs, but my hope is that you'll get better and that you'll feel better, and not just that you'll be able to help others.

Speaker 1 14:42

Hey, my name is John Thurman. You can find me at johnthurmannet and I'm an author, speaker and licensed mental health professional, an all-around nice guy, and I hope and pray that you will get a grip on your depression, you'll get to feeling better and you'll let the Lord walk you through this, because that's what he specializes in doing. Let me wrap up and I'll close with this this is a day that the Lord has made, and I'll make a choice to rejoice and be glad in it. Thanks so much. God bless you. Don't forget to check out my blog and check out my book. Take care, see you next time.