AUDIO
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Archbishop Peter Jensen's Christmas Message 2011 on the centrality of Jesus to human history
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“When I tread the verge of Jordan,
Bid my anxious fears subside;
Death of deaths, and hell’s destruction
Land me safe on Canaan’s side.”
As a long standing lover of a wide variety of church music, I had the pleasure this weekend of singing at a hymn festival, complete with wonderful organ music and a splendid brass quintet. One of the rousing hymns we sang as we praised God was “Guide Me Oh Thou Great Jehovah” with its emphasis on the assurance of God’s mighty ability to save us from all that life (and death) brings us.
But for many in our churches, despite being faithful Christians, their earthly existence is plagued by great feelings of anxiety – and their constant prayer would be for God to cause their anxious fears to subside. They know well their bible and exhortations to “fear not, for I am with you” and “do not be anxious about anything”. Yet their daily experience can be one of fear and anxiety, which they are well aware, is often not rationally based fear. Their inability to seemingly trust God with the fears they have about life can lead to guilt and depression as they seem to fail to live up to what are seen as, and sometimes preached as, clear commands in the Bible.
Yet many of these people will be suffering from some form of an anxiety disorder which has been well documented by the medical profession. The beyondblue website emphasises the need to distinguish between what is a normal stressful situation and what has developed into an anxiety disorder which can need professional treatment. Anxiety disorders can be caused by genetic susceptibility and environmental factors including present stresses or disruptions to emotional and physical safety during their childhood.
Feeling stressed when faced with a deadline or a major public speaking event is a normal reaction when there is a flooding of stress related hormones which produce the symptoms of a racing heart, fluttering in the stomach and so on. This reaction can even be useful to performers as the increased rush of adrenalin provides extra energy required to complete a performance.
But when these symptoms persist or become overwhelming, for example in the case of panic attacks, what has been a normal reaction has been transformed into one which is draining and frightening.
beyondblue has a helpful checklist concerning the amount of worrying that is done and any additional symptoms of feeling “on the edge’, irritable, easily tired, difficulty in concentrating, difficulty in sleeping or muscle pain in the jaw or back which can help indicate that simple stress has advanced into a anxiety disorder. Professional help which may include counselling and/or medication can be recommended after assessment by a mental health professional.
So what about our Christian response to our own or other’s anxieties? Firstly we can gently remind them and ourselves that God is in control, and ask for his peace about the situation. For our friends with anxiety, we can pray that for them regularly, but also suggest that they see a professional if their anxiety does not lessen over time. Secondly, if someone is seeing a Christian practitioner, counsellor or psychologist, incorporating aspects of faith practices into their treatment, such as using scriptural truths as part of their challenging their irrational thinking, can be greatly helpful.
Feature Photo: anna gutermuth
good article. I think the area of mental health is always going to be hard to tackle and it is very easy to generalise about.
For me, Phil 4:6-7 is always helpfull in remembering that God is watching all and has total control. Remembering that is paramount!
Another point that should be emphasised is the area of counsellors. So many people I have known have gone to non-Christian counsellors and the information I have heard back is dangerous to say the least.
I will finish with a question. Are we breeding/emphasising/growing a culture where stress that people "handled" 20 years is now palmed off to a medical practioner or drugs?
I know there is more information now but does that make it better?
Also, I just looked at the Beyond Blue website and I am left wondering, should we be promoting a group that says it is ok to march in the Mardi Gras? Are they a Christian organisation? If not, is there a Christian alternative?
I'm not quite sure what you are referring to here, but you could look at my article "help we've got problems" in the archives about ways in which to find a good counsellor/psychologist.
Re palming people off to others which we didn't do 20 yrs ago - that's probably true that we didn't - for one think we didn't know as much about anxiety and depresion as a mental health disorder as we do today nor did we have the services. And that wasn't always a good thing: I frequently hear horror stories from clients from living with or being raised by people who obviously had untreated mental health conditions. Not that I want to rush to meidicalise all of the human condition - I was a bit dismayed to read that chronic grief is now listed as a mental health disorder in the latest DSMV used to diasnose mental illness.
Finally re using beyondblue - no it is not a Christian website but there is still much sound psychological information there to be had. There are some Christian alternatives, but none of the ones I have come across are as well produced as beyondblue with good fact sheets for reproduction etc. I have my personal gripe with beyondblue in that they only acknowledge psychologists as being suitable for treatment of anxiety and depression - they ignore the counselling and psychotherapy professionals.
Depression itself is merely a symptom. It's driver is stress, whether external or internal. My depression is generated by deep fear and anxiety, orginiating in early childhood, which leaves me permanently stressed.
Part of modern stress is the pace at which it is lived, and the lack of sleep most of us seem to suffer, simply because there are too many alternatives.
If you have kids, help them avoid stress by turning off some the devices - the T.V., the computer, the phone, the MP3 player, the X-Box. Take time to relate and remove things which distract attention. Create calm in your home.
Teach them about puting time into people, face to face, not electronically.
Sadly, some either like to fill their lives with busyness or to be as slack as possible; normally the former.
Futher, many don't easily give up control of their lives to a God they worship or tell others about, because then we would be "out of control" little vegemites, and this would not sit well; but we need to introduce more balance and have more faith in a Loving Powerful God who wants not constant anxiety or depression, but the best for us!
I have argued elsewhere that in one sense you are right in that we seem to focus on what would have been trivial things to a generation living through the depression and not having enough food to put on the table. Having the "leisure" and resources to notice and deal with conditions like depression and anxiety is part of the luxury of living in the affluence that most of us emjoy in Australia.
Hi Ron,
according to the Christian GP who "Margin", this generations faces more 'things per person' than ever before in history. We have it good, but the good life is faster with more phone calls and emails and apps and software and career courses and life changes than ever before.
EG: I could have bought a complicated digital watch, but I decided to go with analogue just so I didn't have to learn how to program the thing!
There's no wiggle room left, and people need skills to reinsert a bit of 'margin' or space or wiggle room into their weeks where nothing is booked, just in case 'being human' happens to them. In other words, the sheer speed of society today is vastly different to 20 years ago. He documents societal stress levels every time a new technology comes in. The telephone increased stress, then the TV, then the mobile phones and internet and now almost EVERYTHING we do requires us to spend hours and hours learning how to do it! Nicky, 'connectivity' has been documented to cause increased stress. It's a great tool, but we need to control it. It can so easily control us.
This might sound cliche to some — so I just wanted to back David Ashton here. I love a good computer game, and have laughed until I cried at some of the games I've shared with my son and his friends. They have been real bonding moments.
But we have a time limit each day, it's only after homework and piano are done, and then we have Sunday's free of computer games. But it's not just the game time, it's preparing the games. There's always the next version or patch or pack. Is it compatible, why doesn't it work, where's the instruction book, why is there ANOTHER internet forum to join, what was my password, why do you need to find that hold hard drive that had those old files, and where is that old ethernet cable that joins it all up, and why won't the visitor's laptops join our wireless network?
Aaaarrgh!
And this after a full week of running a business, adjusting to a new career myself, and various church and family commitments and issues. What was that about "My yoke is light"?