Mental Health and A Prayer - 17 April 2024

 

(This was from my letter to my congregation today - 17 April 2024)

The Kaiser Foundation, and several other organizations, are reporting on the rise of men, women, teens and kids who are having an increase in mental health troubles. For example, some 40% of young adults between 18-29 report they have been told by medical professionals they have a mental health condition (usually depression or anxiety issues). Or, half of all adults say they or a family member have experienced a severe mental health crisis.

I mention this because in the last two years I have either interacted and walked with more people than I ever have before, who are burdened with serious mental illness or whose loved ones were going through a mental health crisis. In all my years in the Military, and in ministry, these last two years have been the largest numbers I’ve ever been involved with. Some have been Christian ministers. Others have been people who have drifted into my orbit and sought my help. Most have been adults, a few have been younger people.

Which brings me to this prayer I wrote this morning in my devotions. I was reading Psalm 65-66, which are filled with distress and critical concerns. But in each of these Psalms the sacred songwriter comes back around to the traits and character of God. For example, how God is the one who “stills the roaring of the seas, the roaring of their waves, the tumult of the peoples” (65:7). And how after being taken through a severe trial, God brought the writer out, “we went through fire and through water; yet you have brought us out to a place of abundance” (66:12).

And so, thinking over these two Psalms, and thinking about the list of people I have been engaged with who are going through dark times and mental crises, I penned this prayer as I prayed for them, which I now offer to you:

Lord, you bring order to the unruly minds, unruly hearts, unruly lives of men, women, girls, and boys. Hear my prayer for these (…here I mention them by name…). All are being unnerved with mental illness. And yet, you who still the roaring of the seas, the roaring of the waves, the tumult of the peoples (Psalm 65:7), still the mental hurricane roaring in their minds, the tumult they are experiencing! Bring them through the “fire and water” and bring them out “to the place of abundance” (Psalm 66:12). Amen.

I would encourage you to use this prayer. You might even want to sit down with your friend or loved one going through a stormy season and hand them a copy of this prayer, and then pray it with them.

Finally, you would be richly aided if you take up either of these books (or both of them) and read them. (1) “On Getting Out of Bed: The Burden & Gift of Living” by an English professor at OBU and a member of a PCA church, Alan Noble. (2) “A Quiet Mind to Suffer With: Mental Illness, Trauma, and the Death of Christ” by John Andrew Bryant, who has a diagnosed mental illness.

“Blessed be God,

because he has not rejected my prayer

or removed his steadfast love from me!”

(Psalm 66:20)

Pastor Mike