The other day I wrote a short post, and linked to an older one, suggesting counselling and therapy really ought not to be viewed as the enemy of the church. It really isn’t and it is deeply damaging to keep insisting it is so. You can read that post here.
In light of that, I thought it might just be worth offering another comment on the same theme. As much as counselling and therapy are not enemies of the church, there is equally nothing evil or anti-Christian about antidepressants either.
It isn’t uncommon to hear Christians argue that antidepressants really aren’t for believers. Whether it is a denial of total depravity and its effects, a belief that Christians ought to have the faith to be healthy and happy all the time or a belief that the Holy Spirit operates like a mental illness vaccine, it’s unclear. But wherever there is talk of mental health issues, there will be a professing Christian somewhere telling you antidepressants are not the answer and are detrimental to your spiritual life for reasons that are not altogether clear.
This is your periodic public service announcement that antidepressants are perfectly legitimate forms of medicine with a good track record of therapeutic benefit for those suffering from long term depression. Being given antidepressants by your doctor is just as much the Lord’s provision for you as taking the drugs prescribed to you for cancer. It is all medicine, with plenty of studies and evidence backing their value, and God’s provision for you made available by common grace at work through your doctor.
There is no credible biblical reason to eschew medicine given to you by your doctor. Nothing changes that fact just because it is dealing with a mind that won’t function properly as opposed to a liver or heart that won’t function properly either. The legitimacy of doctors prescribing medicine doesn’t suddenly become illegitimate because it will benefit your mental health.
It is categorically the case that were I not in receipt of my particular antidepressants I would be dead now. Whilst it is no guarantee that antidepressants will always work (what medicine ever offers 100% guarantees like that?), and there can be a lot of chopping and changing before the right ones for your particular situation can be found, to encourage people throw away their antidepressants and rely on faith will lead to many being seriously harmed and even dying. It is arrogant, presumptuous and testing God to demand he fix us in ways he has not promised. It is equally obtuse to reject his provision of doctors prescribing medicines with a track record of working in order to do so.
Christians who are untrained in these things do great damage suggesting that believers ought not to utilise therapeutic provision that has a track record of working helpfully for people. This includes counselling, psychiatry and antidepressants. We need to stop seeing trained professionals as ‘the enemy’ and, instead, thank God for his provision of people who are meaningfully able to help us as we suffer. Listen to your doctor, heed their advice and take the things they give you – therapy, antidepressants, whatever it may be – and give thanks to God if and when they work.
Morning Stephen
I was about to reply on your other blog about counselling again, until I saw this. I’ve been on Mirtazapine 15mg for almost 13 years now. They were primarily to secure a decent night’s sleep, which, by and large, despite my current apathetic mental state, they’ve done. It’s the difference between getting 6 hours sleep and getting maybe a couple of hours if I’m lucky.
I’ve listened to Philippians 4:6-7 being preached at my church and often, facetiously thought “Oh yeah, fantastic, just don’t be anxious, why didn’t I think of that”.
I’ve also fallen down the rabbit hole of going on Youtube and listening to the likes of Joe Kirby (Off The Kirb Misistries, you’re probably familiar with him?) tell me that anxiety is a sin in itself, which, I don’t know whether that’s true or not to be honest with you, but either way, it doesn’t really help.
It even, on a bad day, gets me questioning my assurance because I muse on whether the Holy Spirit is in me at all if I can’t see past the brain fog that stops me from praying and makes me feel like God is distant.
So again, thank you for posting this. It is a relief to hear an alternative voice among all of the “You should be living life with joy and be grateful for the trials you’re facing”, which, I know is true in a sense, but almost impossible to do in practise a lot of the time.
Mark
Hi Mark,
I, too, have been on 30mg of Mirtazipine for the last 16 years. When I was at my worst, I was on 45mg of Mirtazipine to be taken concurrently with Venlofaxine, Diazepam and Zopiclone. When I took all four together, if I was lucky I got maybe 4 hours of sleep, which was an improvement on the all-out insomnia I had been suffering with for months. Fortunately, I no longer need most of that, I remain solely on a 30mg dose of Mirtazipine, and for the most of the last 14-15 years, I have suffered only very minor, and mercifully fairly short-lived, episodes that are entirely manageable and not utterly debilitating.
I know of Joe Kirby, though I haven’t specifically heard his comments on mental health and haven’t followed his ministry particularly. I only really know the name. I am, however, long in the tooth enough to have heard the same kind of comments in a multitude of places, again and again, from frankly ignorant people. I have written lots of times on this blog around the issue of mental health, both from my perspective as a sufferer and as a pastor who (I hope) knows some of his limitations and does not consider himself omni-competent.
In light of your last two paragraphs, perhaps the following two articles may be of some further help to you:
https://buildingjerusalem.blog/2023/04/12/your-depression-is-not-necessarily-a-result-of-your-sin/
https://buildingjerusalem.blog/2025/02/24/six-things-the-bible-says-about-mental-health-disorders/
I hope you find something useful in these.