At that time Jesus declared, "I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yea, Father, for such was thy gracious will. All things have been delivered to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and any one to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
Despair, despondency, discouragement, the blues - that down and out feeling - those dark moods of depression. Does any of that sound familiar? According to analysts, these experiences are exceedingly common in our time. If surveys are in any way accurate, few people there are who have not experienced something of despondency or depression in our hectic age. As the spiritual puts it, "Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. Sometimes I’m up and sometimes I’m down. Oh, yes, Lord. Sometimes I’m almost on the ground. Oh, yes, Lord. Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. Nobody knows but Jesus."
Fortunately, he knows all about it, and I think there are some things that his Word says can be done about it. But, first we ought to consider the causes of this feeling.
Someone has said that this condition is primarily the result of two so-called viruses: viruses B and H. B for boredom and H for haste. It is said of the great naturalist, John Burroughs, associate of John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt, that from the time of his birth until his death eighty-four years later, he never seemed to have known a day of boredom or an hour of haste. He could savor life. He didn’t simply exist; he lived. When he drank a glass of water, he smacked his lips as if it were a rare experience. When he took a walk, he didn’t just walk, but he savored the beauty of the skies and the scent of the trees around him, and even the rustling of the grass - a man who had learned to avoid viruses B and H in his life.
How intensely have we been infected by them? One way to check whether you have been infected by boredom is to notice whether there is fatigue in your life. Can you hardly make it through the day? Are you all worn out? Do you wonder why you’re so tired? Have you ever noticed that when you felt that way - like you could hardly get out of your chair - and someone happened to come with good news or an idea of doing something that you really love to do, all of a sudden it was like a shot of adrenalin, and you were ready to go! It’s a great cure for virus B - a little something different.
If you were out on the desert and saw the same sand spread in the same way or the same mounds everywhere you looked, you would have a feeling of being lost and would get weary just looking at it. Or if you were out at sea and your boat were sunk and there would be nothing around you but the same kind of waves and no landmark or anything to be found, you would have that sinking feeling of lostness. Or in a forest, where all the trees have come to look alike, you wouldn’t even know which way to go. But some oasis in the desert or some buoy or some different tree can remove that feeling. Something different in your life can help.
God didn’t build a rut for us to live in during our earthly life. He created a fantastic world with many surprises to keep us alert and inquisitive. "God has made so many things, we should be as happy as kings," as one author put it. J. Henri Fabri, the French entomologist, said, "Human knowledge will have to be erased in the archives of mankind before we possess the last word that has to be said to us by a gnat." Have you ever listened to a gnat to learn what it has to say? I haven’t. But he found them interesting. There are many different things, whether it is the mysteries that lie enfolded in the feather of a robin or a growing blade of grass. This is an amazing world! The more you investigate the creation of God, the more complex and intricate and amazing and wonderful it becomes.
Surely as we observe this world, we learn that God does not want us to be bored. He has said, "This is the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it." (Psalm 118:24)
It is surprising how many people arise in the morning and look at the day which God has made and say, "Blah!" From deep down in their rut, they say, "blah." They don’t realize the problem lies with them.
Maybe you haven’t been infected with boredom; I must confess that it hasn’t been my particular problem. ln my lifetime as a Christian, I have had fairly well the opposite experience.
But virus H, which stands for "haste," is another matter. Here I must confess that this infection, on occasion, is serious. For me it is a liability. How about you? Have you ever analyzed what haste does to life? It robs life of all its joy and meaning. It speeds life up to an intolerable tempo and finally reduces it to one huge, fuzzy blur. It’s like taking a tour through the Louvre, which I had to take within thirty minutes on a visit to France some years ago. I went through at a fast sprint and really didn’t get much out of it.
The Scriptures remind us that Jesus was never in a hurry. Did he get much done? He just became the Redeemer of the world; he did more than any person ever did in the history of humankind, but he was never in a hurry. Would that God might grant us the grace to order our lives so that haste may not rob us of the joy of experiencing what he has given to us.
Haste also robs us of thankfulness, because we don’t have the chance to experience the goodness of God in the rush of this aspirin-and-ulcer age where we fly from one thing to another. Did you ever stop just to take a long look at a cloud or go out and look at a tree? We are told it is good for the soul. A period of quiet time, reflection, and meditation on a regular basis is a helpful tonic.
Another problem we face as moderns is that we don’t have the right perspective for our lives. We don’t seem to get the view of things that we ought to have, If we could just see each day and our entire life in the way that God sees it (especially from the perspective of eternity), life would not become so meaningless. Without the eternal perspective, it’s easy for us to fall into sin. When we enter into that situation, depression and sadness can certainly overtake us as nothing else can. Who of us has not, at times, felt deep sadness and despondency over transgressions and sins of the past that come up to haunt us? What can we do about it? Jesus says, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." (Matthew 11:28) As we come to him in penitence and faith, we can claim his forgiveness, his mercy which is new every morning and fresh every day. We can look to the cross and claim the free grace and pardon of God. We can know that all our sins were washed away, that they have been made white as snow, that they have been blotted out. He has buried our sins in the ocean of his forgiveness, never to be brought against us any more. If we really stand on that sure word, then we can rejoice. If we truly believe this message, we will thrill to hear it.
Besides the problems of boredom, haste, and lack of perspective, frequently the thing that gets us down is simply the present problem of the moment. There are the frustrations of the hour that face us.
What is the cure for discouragement, despondency and gloom? You may be familiar with the antidote prescribed by the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, an institution working with the problem of depression and general despondency. Some of you may have heard of Rochester’s famous formula for life: work, play, love and worship. These are the ultimates in life that must be kept in proper balance. The clinic has made them into a symbol of four arms. Whenever one or more of these arms becomes a complete stub, then the result is that depression and down-and-out feeling of which we speak.
It might be important for each of us to determine then, which, if any, of these arms may be missing in our lives. One arm that we would want to examine carefully would be the arm of worship. Not so much the one or two hours spent - in the 168 hours of the week - at church, but are we spending time daily with God in prayer, meditation, Bible study, and reflection? Do we have set aside for ourselves a regular quiet time each day? God in Christ says: "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden" ... That’s how you’ll finally get rest. (11:8) This arm we must not overlook in our honest attempt to get over that weary and exhausted feeling or the blues in general. "Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not neither is weary? ... He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might He increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint." (Isaiah 40:28-31 KJV)
As we maintain a posture of worship and praise toward our Lord and Savior, we become increasingly persuaded that nothing in this temporal life can overwhelm us, but rather that all things can work together for our good, regardless of what they might be.
William Cowper who wrote the hymn, "God moves in a mysterious way," was overwhelmed by problems in the present. He was down so deep in the slough of despondency that he couldn’t see out. Finally he decided that his problems were too great, that there was nothing else he could do but end it all. He took a gun and aimed it, but it didn’t go off. He threw down the gun and got a rope and hanged himself from the chandelier, but the rope broke! He took lethal poison but recovered! Finally, he decided the only thing to do would be to throw himself into the river. He went out and hailed a taxi - a horse and carriage - and told the driver to take him to the Thames. Now a taxi driver in London could find the Thames with his eyes closed. But it was a foggy, miserable day and the cab driver couldn’t find the river! He went down this street and that street hut could not find it. He spent over an hour, and finally he ended up in front of Cowper’s hotel. So Cowper got out, went upstairs, and was pacing back and forth in his room when his eyes fell on a Bible. He opened it and read of the love of God, who said that he would never leave us nor forsake us; who said that he would wash away our sins; who said that he would work all things together for our good. William Cowper right there acknowledged Christ as his Savior, trusted in him as his Lord, and later wrote the words: "God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants His footsteps in the sea, and rides upon the storm." He had come to know that even the future was in the hands of God; that nothing would come to him that didn’t come through the filter of a Father’s love.
Are we not so often burdened by the fears of what tomorrow may bring? Are not these anxieties simply interest that we pay in advance on a debt that we may never incur? How many of us pay that interest regularly? What is its toll? How much does it rob us of joy? The psalmist has said, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul, and why art thou disquieted in me? Hope thou in God: For I shall yet praise Him for He is the help of His countenance." (Psalm 42:5)
Do you really believe that God is working all things together for your good? Even if it is suffering, God can be using it to forward his purpose in your life.
John Calvin suffered greatly from many plagues during his life. He finally died with asthma. His final words are some of the most remarkable dying words that any Christian has spoken. As his friends were gathered about his bedside, he was trying to comfort them amidst his affliction. As he was breathing his last, he spoke these words: "For I reckon that the suffering of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the ..." and he died. He didn’t say the rest of the verse - he experienced it - "... With the glory which shall be revealed in us." (Romans 8:18) He found that even his sufferings had brought him to the place of complete submission to God. He knew that all things were working together for good in the lives of them that love God.
If we are confident of that, and if we have indeed surrendered our burden unto the Lord, then even the longest illness, the most grievous injustice, the greatest calamities or catastrophes, cannot harm us. Then who is there to fear? Why should we be cast down and despondent?
So, not only do we have the antidote to depression in overcoming boredom, dealing with haste, determining what our purpose ultimately is in life, but finally in maintaining our fellowship with our Savior in meditation, prayer, and communion with him. "Come to me ... And I will give you rest" are his reassuring words. Amen.