When You Cannot See

When we go through hard times, we can feel swept off our feet and cast down without hope.  It's also tough when things are going well and depression unexpectedly hits.  Christians with genuine faith are no exception.  Sometimes we are not alright and we can feel something is very wrong, though we can't put a finger on it.  I can compare my experience after delivering a sermon to someone suffering from postnatal depression yet on a spiritual level.  I want to "hit it out of the park" at every opportunity God provides me to preach, yet I often kick myself for falling short.  Then I need to dust myself off and throw myself into the process of preparation again - despite feeling down and worthless.  There are fleeting times of encouragement and the euphoria of apparent usefulness or progress, but these glad feelings can instantly evaporate as I sink to great depths and wonder if it is time to hang up the boots.

Apparently I am not alone in the struggle with feeling low as I labour in the Word and seek to follow Jesus.  The LORD prompted me to read a chapter called "The Minister's Fainting Fits" in Spurgeon's Lectures To My Students, a book which has been very useful to me over the years.  It is absolutely crammed with scriptural content and wisdom which has challenged and encouraged me.  The quote is long, but allow me to share the last paragraph from the aforementioned chapter as it was what I needed to hear today - and hopefully will be a blessing to you as well:

"The lesson of wisdom is, be not dismayed by soul-trouble.  Count it no strange thing, but a part of ordinary ministerial experience.  Should the power of depression be more than ordinary, think not that all is over with your usefulness.  Cast not away your confidence, for it hath great recompense of reward.  Even if the enemy's foot be on your neck, expect to rise and overthrow him.  Cast the burden of the present, along with the sin of the past and the fear of the future, upon the Lord, who forsaketh not His saints.  Live by the day - ay, by the hour.  Put no trust in frames and feelings.  Care more for a grain of faith than a ton of excitement.  Trust in God alone, and lean not on the needs of human help.  Be not surprised when friends fail you:  it is a failing world.  Never count upon immutability in man:  inconstancy you may reckon upon without fear of disappointment.  The disciples of Jesus forsook Him; be not amazed if your adherents wander away to other teachers:  as they were not your all when with you, all is not gone from you with their departure.  Serve God with all your might while the candle is burning, and then when it goes out for a season, you will have the less to regret.  Be content to be nothing, for that is what you are.  When your own emptiness is painfully forced upon your conscientiousness, chide yourself that you ever dreamed of being full except in the Lord.  Set small store by present rewards; be grateful for earnests by the way, but look for the recompensing joy hereafter.  Continue with double earnestness to serve your Lord when no visible result is before you.  Any simpleton can follow the narrow path in the light:  faith's rare wisdom enables us to march on in the dark with infallible accuracy, since she places her hand in that of her Great guide.  Between this and heaven there may be rougher weather yet, but it is all provided for by our covenant Head.  In nothing let us be turned aside from the path which the divine call has urged us to pursue.  Come fair or come foul, the pulpit is our watch-tower, and the ministry our warfare; be it ours, when we cannot see the face of our God, to trust under THE SHADOW OF HIS WINGS." (Spurgeon, C. H. Lectures to My Students: Complete & Unabridged. Ministry Resources Library, Zondervan Publishing House, 1989. pages 154-165)