Our Vows and a Few More Pictures

There are many people we wish we could have invited to our wedding.
Here are our vows and a few more pictures although the photographer has yet to send us the whole disc. http://www.mintphotography.ca/blog/?p=6799

 Andy's vows
Tina; Before God and man, without doubt or hesitation, with all my heart, I marry you. You are - and have been to me - God’s mercy and grace. I never knew that I would love again and I could have never known how much. Forsaking all others, I will cherish you always. I will fan the flame of our affection with words and deeds of devotion and appreciation. I will honor you always. I will seek your security, your rest and your joy. I will serve you in sickness and in health, in riches and in poverty, until God separates us by death. I will always recognize you as God’s gift to me and never forget how precious you are to Him. I will guide us towards holiness. I will love those you love, offering friendship and fatherly affection to Jessica & Danielle. I give you my all and trust you with my all. Please take me as your husband. Please be my wife. 

Tina's vows
Andy, I stand here today before God, our family, and our friends to proclaim my love for you. In you, God has provided a healing in my heart and soul that I never thought possible. Your words have washed over me like cleansing waters. My cup overflows. I admire your love and devotion to the Lord, And I know His love is your standard and your strength, and that you love me with that love. In this same love I promise to respect you, to honor you, and to love you I promise to love and care for your children, Josiah, Katy and Alex as though they were my own. I promise to pray with you and for you. I promise to support you in all you do. I promise to help you serve the Lord and to grow in his love. I will remember that you are not mine alone but that you are 1st His, that we are united by Him and in Him. The Lord will be our strength, our hiding place, our high tower and our intercessor. Above all, I promise to love you with all that I am as I love my own body and with the love of Christ I am blessed to have your love and honored to share my life with you. It is my joy to take you as my husband. Today I will no longer be my own; I freely and fearlessly give myself to you Andy, to be your wife, and your soul mate. To have and to hold forsaking all others, as long as we both shall live.

Sex Talk for Singles

Unfortunately the video did not work out but the Power-Point can be accessed here: http://s3.amazonaws.com/storage.nm-storage.com/brantcommunitychurch/downloads/Sex_Talk_singles_1.pdf

Assess Strategize Be strong Trust 1Ch 19:9 The Ammonites came out and drew up in battle formation at the entrance to their city, while the kings who had come were by themselves in the open country. 10 Joab saw that there were battle lines in front of him and behind him; so he selected some of the best troops in Israel and deployed them against the Arameans. 11 He put the rest of the men under the command of Abishai his brother, and they were deployed against the Ammonites. 12 Joab said, "If the Arameans are too strong for me, then you are to rescue me; but if the Ammonites are too strong for you, then I will rescue you. 13 Be strong and let us fight bravely for our people and the cities of our God. The LORD will do what is good in his sight." I love this attitude! Surrounded by an enemy, he was not sure he could defeat, Joab assesses the situation, strategizes and communicates a plan to the troops and then commands “Be strong!” to fill the men’s hearts with vigour. And then Joab puts the whole outcome in God’s hand, recognizing it may cost him his life. That’s how to fight. We have an enemy who is allowed to cause us great harm. 1Pe 5:8 Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Re 2:10 Do not be afraid of what you are about to suffer. I tell you, the devil will put some of you in prison to test you, and you will suffer persecution for ten days. Be faithful, even to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life. We need to assess our enemy and plan for victory but then we must determine to trust God before we enter into the battle knowing, “The battle belongs to the lord” We could be afraid, but we will have lost ground to the enemy already if we are. The choice of attitude lies before us. We can fear, but our enemy lies defeated, his weapon of fear, impotent. Heb 2:14 Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— 15 and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. May our attitude be like Esther’s Es 4:16 "Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish." Assess. Strategize. Be strong. Trust Christ, regardless of the outcome.

A Sex Talk For Couples

This video is based on 1Corinthians 7:5 "Do not deprive each other.."
If you are frustrated or defiant in your marriage and not experiencing the joy you expect, have a look and see if you can get the conversation started.
Just cut and paste this link into your browser

http://www.brantcommunitychurch.ca/content.cfm?id=390&download_id=232#attached_content

The Best Thing You Can Do For Your Pastor

I whole-heartedly agree that the best thing you can do for your pastor(s) / elders is pray for them. This is a response to http://www.theblazingcenter.com/2012/02/the-best-thing-you-can-do-for-your-pastor.html
Let me state why I am especially passionate about being upheld in prayer today.

God is a God of means. He honors us by using us and making us the channel by which he will accomplish lasting goals. “The” Paul says to Timothy: 1Ti 4:16 “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”

Which along with John 21:17 "Feed my sheep.” Are life verses for me.

The means by which sheep are kept alive is by being led to green pasture by a shepherd. The means by which Timothy would be saved (sanctified which MUST proceed being glorified) was to watch his life and his doctrine and persevere in them. The means by which his hearers would be saved… (sanctified which MUST proceed being glorified) was again Timothy’s perseverance in a pure life and doctrine.

Praying for a Pastor’s perseverance in these, puts a tool in God’s hand by which He ensures the progress of many towards our heavenly home. Notice Paul says, ”you will save” When I preach and teach and counsel and lead an individual to Christ, biblically speaking, I am saving them, sanctifying them. Just like grass and water may save a sheep. I am being used to save, to sanctify them. What a terrifying responsibility, that keeps me from sloth and pursuing ease. What a high, noble, joyous privilege that I would not trade for ANYTHING!!!

Thank-you for your prayers. They are the means by which I can continue to be a means to lasting joy for you.

The Risks of Not Loving

C. S. Lewis on the Danger of Love
By Jonathan Parnell | Feb 14, 2012 12:00 pm


If you were having a cup of tea with C. S. Lewis on Valentine's Day, and you asked him sincerely, "Mr. Lewis, am I better not to love because it's so risky?" — he might say something like this:

Of all arguments against love none makes so strong an appeal to my nature as “Careful! This might lead you to suffering.”

To my nature, my temperament, yes. Not to my conscience. When I respond to that appeal I seem to myself to be a thousand miles away from Christ. If I am sure of anything I am sure that his teaching was never meant to confirm my congenital preference for safe investments and limited liabilities.…

There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness.

But in that casket — safe, dark, motionless, airless — it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.


The Four Loves, (New York, Harcourt, 1960), Kindle Location 1541.

Exhausted

…he pursued… exhausted
Judges 8:12, 15

Gideon and his men pursued their enemies led by Zeba and Zalmunna and though Gideon requested bread from towns along the way, he and his men received none. They pursued, exhausted, yet they were triumphant and displayed that at times we will accomplish what we must only in a state of fatigue.

We like to be well-rested and fed and at the top of our game, but this is not the only condition in which meaningful victories will be won. History is made by weary people who perceive their goals as more important than their performance and keep going, at least for a time, until the opportunities have yielded their potential.

Paul knew the experience of exhaustion in accomplishment.
2 Corinthians 4:8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.

He knew what it was to come to the end of his resources and yet continue pursuing, continue fighting. He knew what it cost to win.

February can bring many people into this state of depletion. It is a time to find appropriate rest and enjoyment, but it is also a time to continue the fight for faith and hope and joy, commodities too precious to neglect.

May we continue to pursue, though perhaps exhausted and anticipate victory granted by God.

Engaged

After dating for a little better than five months, Tina and I are happy to announce our engagement. We have not set an exact date yet but are aiming for the end of June or the beginning of July. It is an amazing thing for the two of us, both widows, to experience the kind of work that God does. It is He who says, “I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.” Jeremiah 31:13

It is good to have his word as our guide.

1Timothy 5:14
I counsel younger widows to marry…

Genesis 2:18
The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone…

1Corinthians 7:2
Each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.

1Corinthians 7:39
A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. If her husband dies, she is free to marry anyone she wishes, but only if he loves the Lord.

We are grateful for His guidance and His provision and are happy for the encouragement of so many. Thanks to everyone who has increased our joy by sharing it.

"unlovableness"

Thank-you for getting this. That is my point. "unovableness" is a lie of the Devil planted early on in a child’s life and may become so familiar that it is difficult to imagine ever living without it. We may even come to embrace it, using it as a self-pitying crutch to reject the love of God. We may in fact use it to refuse to live under his loving constraint and guidance and grace. God does love you and me. We are lovable. We are loved. You must choose to either accept His love or reject it and be responsible for that choice. There is no excuse in saying, "I am unlovable". That doesn’t even exist.

Loved

From the depths of my being, at the core of my heart, from my earliest childhood memories, I have found it impossible to believe that I am loved by anyone let alone God.

This didn’t stem from a lack of affection from parents or friends but results from an impenetrable gate leading to my heart that deflects displays of love because I don’t deserve them.

I am unlovable. I am too bad, too ugly, too me. I think this is a lie. It must be. I think it is the cause of joyless anxiety. I think it feeds on every negative that ever occurs and that they strengthen the belief that I am not loved, that God really doesn’t care, that my belief was right all along.

This is a daily fight for me, to believe that I am loved, to allow that belief to fill me with joy and security. I need God’s word every day to remind me that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

There is a love that does not depend on my goodness or accomplishments. It just comes from God because he is love and because he wants to love us and just because he does. He does. I don’t know why, but then, there are a lot of things I don’t know.

God Suffers

I am going to write. I amn not going to correct grammar spelling or theology. I am not going to use the backspace key. This is what I think. God suffers. We get wond u in the concept that he is the cause of suffering but he is also the cause of his own suffering. He is “longsufferin” Every injustice every agnostic, atheistic moment cuts just as deep as the whip or the nnails though we can’t get to him physically now. Every cult every idol , the death ov every evil person in which he takes no pleasure cause him to suffer. We are in this together longing for complete joy together. He is no above our suffering but immersed in it. It is a facet of our fellowship. He is righteous. He is love . there is bno other plan that could have expressed his nature. Thi is the plan and it must be so. God suffers. He hates this just as much as we do at times. He weeps. One day we will laugh together.

From Havoc To Heaven

Isa 54:16 "See, it is I who created the blacksmith who fans the coals into flame and forges a weapon fit for its work. And it is I who have created the destroyer to work havoc.

God purposes and intends that there be “havoc” and frustration…

Ro 8:20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it…

The created order intentionally contains death, mourning, crying and pain. (Rev 21:4)

Jesus was subjected to it

Ro 6:9 …death no longer has mastery over him.

For a time it did.

For us it does and it will serve us for eternity. We will always enjoy paradise from the vantage point of those who have suffered the deprivation that is a taste of hell. So many have said, if we could just experience heaven and hell for a minute each, we would make a clear choice between the two, but that is what this life is: moments of sheer exuberance and joy and others of the unfulfilled longings of hell.
Every day is an opportunity to make a choice or solidify the one we have made.

This pain serves us daily now, clarifying our choice of Christ. Though it includes earthly disappointments, those disappointments will serve us for all time and eternity. We will never be tempted as Lucifer and his angles were, to abandon heaven for something better. We will have tasted Godlessness and hell and spit it eternally from our mouths. It is this experience that will cause us to cling to heaven gratefully cheerfully and those are good emotions to envision.

Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret?
There are better things ahead than any we leave behind--C.S. Lewis

Glory to God in Chronic Sin

As frustrating as chronic illness can be, it seems to me that there can come a measure of acceptance and a recognition of its capacity to drive us to God and keep us close to him. There can even be a measure of respect and admiration for the perseverance that is demonstrated in one who suffers outwardly.

What seems worse than chronic illness is chronic sin, habitual sin, what we call “besetting” sin, which robs us of joy and self-respect. It can come in many forms: pride, lust, greed, gluttony, anger… And there are none of the perks that go along with chronic illness. It causes us to loathe ourselves or the one whose sin is exposed.

The reality though is that all of us will suffer in one way or another. All of us will take sin to our graves. We may wonder, even become exasperated and ask why the God who commands purity refuses to grant it. Lately I have spoken with several people who at the base of their beings have desires that lead them into what the Bible labels as sexual sin and yet they feel powerless to change it. They fear that only death will take away what must be labeled a sinful desire. (Romans 1:24, 1Peter 4:11)

Though we may never come to the place where we no longer desire what is sinful, it is possible to fully and finally hate that specific evil, even an evil that is an inseparable part of ourselves. And therein lies a spiritual victory. Though we may not be able to flee a tendency or desire or kill it so that it no longer raises its ugly head, we can come to hate it and hate that part of ourselves.

It is the hating of wickedness that God loves. It may be part of the reason why he allows besetting sins. In this state of need, we may humbly come to the place where we know intimately and even predictably a part of our heart that is still inhabited by the enemy, a part of our soul that rebelliously refuses to submit, a hiding place for darkness, a self-deception, a love-affair brewing that we may wish so much weren’t there that it is difficult to admit that it is. But time and again we must confront it and be taught to despise it to the glory of God. It is this Christ-like passion that we can purse, even when we cannot be completely free from a desire that God labels sinful.

Ps 45:7 You love righteousness and hate wickedness; therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.

Hebrews 1:8 tell us that these are the words of the father spoken over the divine son. The Father loves Jesus because Jesus hates evil. We can too. May those sins that we may never conquer serve us, at least to cause us to hate them and so be loved by God for this Christ-like zeal.

May our hearts produce authentic words that sound like this: “I hate my sin” and may God love us for it.

Determining Factors in Salvation

This is an exerpt from the sermon preached Jan. 2, 2011

Did God lovingly choose me because he knew I would believe or Did I believe because God chose me. The biblical answer to that question is, “Yes”.

The Bible points to both God’s choice and our choice as logical priors like two rails of a train track that go off into the distance never crossing as far as the eye can see, never one rail saying to the other, "I no longer have need of you."

God chose you because he is Sovereign God and has the right to do anything he pleases with what he has made and owns…
Psalm 115:3
Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases.

And the parallel truth is this: When God conceived of the idea of you, he knew you would choose him. His choice matters supremely, but your choice matters completely. But - Let’s look at God first.

Romans 9:11 Before they [The twins, Jacob and Esau] were born, before they had done anything good or bad, she received a message from God. (This message shows that God chooses people according to his own purposes; 12 he calls people, but not according to their good or bad works.) She was told, “Your older son will serve your younger son.” 13 In the words of the Scriptures, “I loved Jacob, but I rejected Esau.” 14 Are we saying, then, that God was unfair? Of course not! 15 For God said to Moses,
“I will show mercy to anyone I choose, and I will show compassion to anyone I choose.” 16 So it is God who decides to show mercy. We can neither choose it nor work for it. 17 For the Scriptures say that God told Pharaoh, “I have appointed you for the very purpose of displaying my power in you and to spread my fame throughout the earth.” 18 So you see, God chooses to show mercy to some, and he chooses to harden the hearts of others so they refuse to listen. 19 Well then, you might say, “Why does God blame people for not responding? Haven’t they simply done what he makes them do?” 20 No, don’t say that. Who are you, a mere human being, to argue with God? Should the thing that was created say to the one who created it, “Why have you made me like this?” 21 When a potter makes jars out of clay, doesn’t he have a right to use the same lump of clay to make one jar for decoration and another to throw garbage into?

In this text God is seen as making independent decisions as to whom he will bless with mercy and compassion based solely on his right as creator of all. God’s choice is seen as independent of ours.
Now – understandably this makes us Crazy. He makes some of us for dishonorable service like Pharaoh and then blames Pharaoh for not bowing to his moral will.

It seems unfair and yet we are told not to talk back – which just pushes our rebellion against this text deeper into our own psyche. – unless – unless we try… to trust God and see him as one who refuses to gamble with our souls and submit to mere chance but rather ensures that some will certainly be saved.

God is God is not capricious, reckless, contingent not dependent on anyone. He could do no other than plan that some would certainly be saved. But within that plan he did not ordain that all would be saved. So we ask Who is at fault?

If I were to maintain the logic that has been established in Romans 9 of the potter and the clay and ask the question. Why did most of the Jews not believe in the Christ –

Logically – I would have to say because God didn’t choose them – he rejected them hated them – That is what logic says, but the text goes on to say more than simply that God is sovereign. It goes on to say man is responsible.

God shatters our narrow logic because his thoughts are higher than out thoughts .
Romans 9:31 but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. 32 Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works.

It’s their fault. Their choice is viewed here as logically prior. They determined their own fate by their refusal to believe. Why didn’t Israel attain righteousness – not because God did or did not do something but because THEY
• tried to work for reward rather than simply trust
• wanted to earn reward rather than simply receive it
• wanted the glory rather than give glory to God.

It was their fault. Their faithlessness was logically prior. It all hinges (at least in this text) on their lack of belief.
Both rails of God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility are seen in Rom 9.
The Bible points to both God’s choice and our choice as logical priors, determining factors in our salvation. This then falls into the ontological gap, the black-hole question, "How can it be?". We don't know.

Missions Prayer

Father would you lead BCC into deeper, more joy-producing fellowship with you, as we seek to obey your command to bring the good news of Jesus’ saving sacrifice to the ends of the earth.
Would you allow us to feel your delight as we represent you to a world in need of your saving grace.
Would you grant us confidence in you and generosity toward your priorities. And then use us and allow us to be encouraged by your victories attained through your strength experienced in our efforts.
We ask it in Jesus’ name.
Amen.

Mission Minded

Have a look at this clip as we prepare our hearts for Sunday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7pT-7dBVhc

And a couple of sites to check out as well

www.partnersinternational.ca

www.joshuaproject.net

Our Competency Comes From Christ Alone

2Co 2:14 But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. 15 For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. 16 To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task?

Or as the KJV says, “who is sufficient for these things?”

Who, in and of themselves, or even with a team of coaches and cheerleaders behind them, is sufficient to represent Christ to elect and non-elect in such a way that they actually experience the presence and the essence of the living Christ so that they feel either encouraged or condemned?

I am not sufficient. The elders are not sufficient. And we are not deluded by some mirage of hierarchy that would suggest that anyone living on this planet is sufficient, hence we are driven to look to Christ and his sufficiency in order to think we might accomplish anything for him in ministry.

Jesus said, “…apart from ME you can do nothing.” John 15:5

Jesus is our sufficiency in ministry, not a more energetic elder’s team, a more functional building, a better ministry plan, more compatible ministry partners or a thousand other excuses we might make to justify stepping back from ministry when feeling our insufficiency rather than simply throwing ourselves on the mercy of Christ and begging, “Use me! Fill me! Provide for me! Give me the words and use them to change and comfort your people and to warn those who do not seem to care.”

The church, you, do ministry not because we are sufficient, but because He is. Any other reason would be vanity.

2Co 3:5 It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own. Our qualification comes from God. 6 He has enabled us to be ministers of his new covenant.

"Gutsy Guilt"

Part of our Christian confidence is that even when we fall into sin and experience God's Fatherly discipline, we will rise again. John Piper calls this "gutsy guilt":
To the fallen saint, who knows the darkness is self-inflicted and feels the futility of looking for hope from a frowning Judge, the Bible gives a shocking example of gutsy guilt. It pictures God’s failed prophet beneath a righteous frown, bearing his chastisement with broken-hearted boldness—
"Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against him, until he pleads my cause and executes judgment for me. He will bring me out to the light." (Micah 7:8-9)
This is courageous contrition. Gutsy guilt. The saint has fallen. The darkness of God’s indignation is on him. He does not blow it off, but waits. And he throws in the face of his accuser the confidence that his indignant Judge will plead his cause and execute justice for (not against) him. This is the application of justification to the fallen saint. Broken-hearted, gutsy guilt.
For further thought, see John Piper's 2002 article "Justification by Faith."

Sovereign, Wise, Loving and Good

Thanks to all who commented on the previous blog. I find this very cathartic and have come to the place where I truly value, as I think Paul did, being joined in “suffering for the gospel.”

2Ti 1:8 So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God,

I think our joy in him, especially in suffering, glorifies him and displays his worth.

Of course, like others, when feeling the pain, I begin to ask the big eternal and universal questions about suffering and why God has planned such an economy of suffering in his story.

The question is asked, “Why would God allow human free-will, knowing that great suffering would result?” The answer is given, “God desires to be freely loved, just as anyone would and so the choice to love him, or to refuse to love him, had to be granted.”

The second question that should be asked is, “But were not we, who love him, chosen to do so, before the foundation of the world?”

Eph 1:4 Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.

Does not our chosen-ness negate our free-will and therefore nullify the previous argument for its necessity?

No. God’s sovereign choice never diminishes the value of our choice to love him or our responsibility when we refuse to trust him, regardless of our inability to comprehend this fact.

I will always have chosen to trust and love God and it will always matter that I did. It matters even now, perhaps most of all when he has allowed circumstances necessary for his plan, his glory, necessary for my eternal good, that can only be seen as negative in and of themselves.

I still have free will. He will not accomplish his will in me apart from mine.

Php 1:6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

He will do this through – in conjunction with - my willingness to see it completed.

Php 2:13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.

Choosing to trust and love him because I want to, because he proves himself sovereign, wise, loving and good has always mattered and it always will.

Complaining Up

I have seen the rock face of scripture bleed life-giving water until I could not help but overflow with what God was speaking through it. There is no better “high” than being thrilled with all that God is saying, especially for one who begged him to speak as a teen.

It has been weeks since I felt overflowing. I sip trickles here and there. I cling to that rock face and beg for water, but nothing fills my soul to overflowing. I cannot get enough of Him. At least not right now. I said that I would not blog for any other reason than that.

This is depression. Perhaps it is the appropriate emotional response to loss. It is accompanied with doubts concerning the goodness of God, the love of God and the trustworthiness for God, things I could never “preach” from the pulpit, but deep waters we all go through.

We’re tempted to pity the depressed. This of course is poison. Pity is feeling sorry for someone and relating to them on that basis which only feeds the illness rather than raising the expectation that it will pass and it will. No one can live here, at least not for long. No sane person would want to.

For now, I have questions without answers, pain without resolve and a hope that is so hard to maintain it takes all my strength. The one thing I need is faith. Faith to believe the promises and the future that God has in store for his children. Faith that he gives and enables me to live, but in reality, what other choice is there but to believe and to live it despite how we may feel. Feelings are not our God. God is.

Job felt it.
Job 30:21 You turn on me ruthlessly; with the might of your hand you attack me.

Jeremiah felt it.
Lam 3:7 He has walled me in so that I cannot escape; he has weighed me down with chains. 8 Even when I call out or cry for help, he shuts out my prayer.

David felt it.
Ps 69:2 Deeper and deeper I sink into the mire; I can’t find a foothold. I am in deep water, and the floods overwhelm me.

Paul felt it
2Co 1:8 We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought we would never live through it.

Perhaps depression is just an avenue for faith, a time in which the expression of faith sounds different.

Ps 142:2 I pour out my complaints before him and tell him all my troubles.

I think this is where to go with it. Not to everyone, perhaps a little with a few, but mostly we ought to “complain up” as Tom Hanks said in Saving Private Ryan

This is still prayer, still faith, just the faith and the prayers of the hurting who hope that One will do something about it, show his compassion, express his care by a means that will actually comfort and restore faith, make it easier to believe in a good, loving, trustworthy God until Our faith is sight. And He will.

1Thes 5:23 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.