Depression Threatens, But there is a Way Out
In 1977 I realised that my heart was in our new leadership role in our new church in Middlesbrough, rather than my job in middle management in ICI. So I left ICI and took a job as a Lecturer at a local College of FE. My thinking was that this teaching job would release much more time and energy for our church leadership responsibilities and my family. This worked out very well for the a year or so.
Then there was a leadership reshuffle in the church, due to growth. I found myself left behind when a new eldership team was formed, news I got to know about on the grapevine. I have to admit I did not take to the new arrangements very well. I became depressed, thinking that things were not working out very well for me. I thought I must have got it wrong and that I did not have the future which I had anticipated when I left ICI.
I was unable to get hold of my emotions and relax in the benefits I had gained. It took something like 4 years for me to come to terms with the new circumstances. Eventually I decided that even though I wanted to give up, I just couldn’t. It would render so much of my life up to that point purposeless!
I decided to do what was in my hand (none of which excited me) with a wholesome attitude and a right spirit. As I did this, circumstances slowly (I’m talking months) began to change. My enjoyment of life started to come back. I was more at ease with myself. About 6 – months later the group we were leading was growing in number and experiencing excellent and unpredictable times together. Then I was asked to become an elder in the church. It was clear that things began to change when I was able to adopt a wholesome and selfless attitude and disposition. This enabled me to be at peace with myself and stop dwelling on what I thought I had lost.
As a Christian, I can look back now and see that God wanted me to accept the new circumstances and trust him with my future. He had caught me out in an area of weakness that I was not aware of: Personal ambition. The choice was this: Was I going to give up on God because things were not working out as I hoped? Or Would I submit to the new arrangements and entrust my future to him?
A key lesson I learned in this process was that it is our heart attitude that matters more than our ambitions.
| Being powerful is like being a lady, if you have to tell people you are, then you aren't. | Margaret Thatcher |
| The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but God will make us good because he loves us. | C S Lewis |
| Fear is misplaced faith. | Kris Vallotton |
| God has already seen every mistake, every failure and every weakness, and the good news is he's already forgiven you. He is not holding it against you. | Joel Osteen |
| God is not nearly so interested in changing your circumstances as he is in changing you. | Joyce Meyer |
| Pray, and let God worry | Martin Luther |
| Those who never change their mind never change anything. | Winston Churchill |
| What you do (for a living) is not who you are. | Celia Apeagyei-Collins |
| People who write you off when you fail know nothing about history and even less about life. No person ever fully succeeds until they fully fail. | Lance Wallnau |
| There is no uncreated being except God. God has no opposite. Satan, the leader or dictator of devils, is the opposite, not of God, but of Michael. | C S Lewis |
| He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. | Jim Elliot |
| You never know how much you really believe anything until it's truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life or death to you. | C S Lewis |
| If you know you are loved, faith is easy. It's easy to trust someone you know loves you. | David Forster |
| Every moment that you spend upset, despaired, anguished, angry, afraid or hurt, because of the behaviour of someone else in your life, is a moment in which you have given up control of your life. | Unknown |
| Remember, you do not have to live today by how you feel, nor by what you think about yourself, nor by what someone else thinks about you. The person who created you thinks you are wonderful, and he waits with open arms for you to agree with him. | David Forster |
| Shift gears from doing something in God's presence to simply being in God's presence. | Lance Wallnau |
| Your future doesn't depend on what is in front of you, it depends on who is in you. | Lance Wallnau |
| Did you know that you are utterly and completely loved by God, without doing a single thing, good or bad. | David Forster |
| no one knows how bad they are until they have tried very hard to be good.. | C S Lewis |
| If we are living daily by faith, we will be constantly over our head; Beyond our ability to do this our that. We should all be in that place in some area of our life. If we are not, we will be like an old wineskin; too rigid and inflexible to receive the Lord's new wine. | Rick Joyner |
| For a believer intimacy with God is not an option, it's a necessity. Guidance and direction depend on this intimacy and sensitivity to Holy Spirit. There is no substitute for the latter. | Graham Cooke |
| Jesus reveals the Father to us. He gives us peace and rest. He is not a hard taskmaster. | David Forster |
| The God who creates everything, pursues you. Don't let anyone tell you you're are worth less than that. | Louie Giglio |
| In the kingdom, physical obedience brings spiritual release. | Bill Johnson |
| Don't be surprised if you pray for nearness to God and he sends a trial. Nearness always requires dependence. | Desiringgod.org |
| Our corporate worship doesn't meet a need in God, it meets a need in us. | Sam Storms |
| How you feel is not who you are. Feelings are great servants and terrible masters. | Kris Vallotton |
| There is a lot that is good in your life. Don't take it for granted. Don't get so focused on the struggle that you mis the gift of today. | Joel Osteen |
| The enemy commits identity theft when you believe you must earn what God freely gives. | Alison Brown |
| If you agree with your creator and receive what he freely gives, you will have serenity in your identity and confidence in your countenance. | David Forster |
| If you always do what you always did, you'll always get what you always got. | David Forster |
| A satisfying and exciting life organises around an identity focused on Jesus, not the church.. | Graham Cooke |
| Satan cannot impose his will on anyone, he has to have our agreement. | Graham Cooke |
| Every day adjust yourself to where God is taking you, that is, toward the prophetic vision he has given you. | Lance Wallnau |
| Real faith is not faith in an outcome (of a particular situation or circumstance), it's faith in a person. | David Forster |
| Be in no doubt that God will redeem the losses and mistakes of your past life. | David Forster |
| God cannot give us happiness and peace apart from himself, because there is simply no such thing. | C S Lewis |
| Wealth, women and status; these are the major temptations that can draw a man away from God. Each is morally neutral; yet given the appropriate significance, each can control us. | David Forster |
| The devil's finest trick is to persuade you that he doesn't exist. | Anon |
| Fear is the enemy of love. The two cannot exist together. We have to choose daily: Fear or Love. | David Forster |
| You are not saved because of the quality of your faith. You are saved because of the object of your faith; The Redeemer! | Tim Keller |
| Revival goes from the bottom up; Reformation goes from the top down. Therefore reformation is institutional and revival is personal. | Lance Wallnau |
| Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts. | Albert Einstein |
| Inner peace is key to experiencing God's presence. Rest is a weapon against the enemy | Graham Cooke |
| Fairy tales don't tell children that dragons exist. Children know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed. | G K Chesterton |
| When you are at peace with God, you will be at peace with yourself and with other people. | David Forster |
| You can believe in Christianity in the same way you believe that the sun has risen; Firstly, because you see it and secondly because by it you see everything else. | C S Lewis |
| A little while ago I became old enough to start believing in fairy tales again. This means there are far better things ahead of me then what I have left behind. | C S Lewis |
| Your unfinished destiny is your most potent argument with death. | Graham Cooke |
| I am not focused on what I am not, I am focused on what he is for me. | David Forster |
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