Effectively Praying for the Despondent
I have prayed for people who were so despondent and depressed, I feared for their lives. Some of them did die. This does not mean my prayers (and yours) were ineffective. Over years of seeing this sorrow, God has shown me the truth and relieved me of the shame that accused me of not doing enough for my loved ones. He reminded me that he honors and hears our prayers, but he also does not force his will on people. Sometimes people give up, even when we do our best for them. God does not condemn us, and we must not condemn ourselves. Please join me as I share what God has taught me about people who suffer this level of depression, and his reassurances for them and for us.
First, I want to urge my readers to fight. Fight for the joy and peace in your own life. Pray fervently, and never be ashamed to cry in pain and to tell God your anger, confusion and fears. Never be afraid to call on Jesus’ name to rebuke Satan when he attacks you or a loved one. The Scriptures consistently tell us to fight in the Spirit. We fight for our rights; we vote according to God’s standards; we care for our health; we do so many things to fight for life in God.
If the despondent person is very young, we need to fight much harder, because young people should never wither away. In this post, I refer to mature people, all of whom are over 60 years of age. When a young person falls into such a depression, she has her entire life ahead of her. We must urge her to get professional help. But with mature people, we may not have as much power to make a change. Please read on to see what I have learned.
We or a loved one may have times when the fight seems too exhausting. This can occur due to unrelenting problems, from health, to relationships, to finances, and to other things. When we find no hope after fighting for a long time, we may want to give up (Proverbs 13:12, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.”) This is when we can come alongside a hurting sister or brother and encourage her or him (1Thess.5:11, “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.”) or we may need someone to come alongside us. Even if we overcome adversity, sometimes our loved ones think they cannot overcome it. They may surrender to their sorrow, eat less and less, stop fighting and die.
The human body can actually begin to shut down when a person stops fighting to live. And intense stress can bring about cardio-vascular death, often called “Broken Heart Syndrome.” My father suffered this, in the span of three weeks, after he finally admitted my mom was never going to recover but die. In those 3 weeks he had 2 or 3 heart attacks. The last was so severe, the coroner said my dad could not have recovered (the coroner diagnosed that there had been multiple heart attacks in that 3 week period.) Debbie Reynolds also died in a similar way, the day after her daughter abruptly died. She told her son she wanted to be with her daughter, and within 24 hours, Ms. Reynolds had died.
These deaths do not mean these people committed suicide or that they did not love God. My father dearly loved the Lord. Prior to his agreement that my mom was dying, my dad had been urging my mom to eat more and to resume walking. My dad was riding his bike, skiing, spending time with loved ones in the year that my mom was in hospice care. My dad was very happy, convinced he could help my mom. He had just bought a new hot tub, and it had not even been shipped when my dad died (so we were able to cancel the order.) My dad had a desire to live, until he accepted the truth that my mom was dying. Four days before he died, he told his Bible study leader that he was ready to die. My dad had been strong, hardy and joyful. But once he acknowledged my mom’s impending death, he gave up on life. My mom died the next month too.
A friend was only 61 years old when I last spoke to him. He was crushed by estrangements and also deaths of loved ones in the last few years, as well as his divorce. He had been losing weight, and his normally cheerful personality had become sad and full of complaints. He even forgot to ask how I was doing. He only complained. Yet he had been such a bright, gifted man, full of kindness and generosity. His sorrow engulfed him. I did my best to take his calls and listen to him, offer him comfort, and pray with him. He remained in my daily prayers. I sent him a card, and he said it comforted him. But one day the calls stopped, and my calls ended up in his phone mail box which filled up, and then it was disconnected. My wellness call to the local sheriff’s office in Ohio confirmed my fear. My friend had died. I felt so terrible and wondered if I should have called him more or if I should have said more to him. I was crushed and confused.
Please know this is Satan’s bait. Anytime our loved ones die, Satan will stir up trouble and tell us we should have done more for them, or make us feel guilty that we have survived, when they died (hence the title “Survivor’s guilt.) God appoints a time for us to die. Yes, we can impact our day of death whether through abuse of alcohol and drugs or poor health choices or other things (1John5:17, “…a sin that leads to death.”) Not only can our sin hasten our death, but if we give up fighting to live, our bodies will eventually respond, and we will die. I have seen this before. I had a friend who gave so much to others. She was a godly woman who loved to serve people. But she got a mild form of cancer that was easily treated. The survival rate was very high. But she was so depressed, she actually scolded me for having hope of any kind. She said that life is bad. I know life is not bad. It is God’s gift (Acts.17:25b, “He himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.”) But I did not scold her back. I simply kept listening to her and being available. But one day she fell dead. She had just given up.
I felt terrible, but then a friend told me a similar story about a godly relative of hers who gave and gave, but over time, she became very negative and died (while in relatively good health like my friend.) God honors our wishes. If we refuse to live, eventually God will honor our wish and take us. We, the survivors, must not blame ourselves. There are times when we cannot force a person to live. Remember God does not even force people to believe in Him. So he will not force people to live long years of despondence when they want to die. This does not mean they committed suicide. They just stopped fighting.
It is essential we accept this truth. We cannot force people to become happy and live. We cannot force that in our prayers for them. Even if we pray, “The Lord rebuke you Satan,” (Zach.3:2a and Jude:9) against Satan’s assault upon that person, the person herself (or himself) may reject our prayers and still give up. This does not make us failures. Remember that Jeremiah had decades of ministry, and very few people repented due to his message. Yet God told Jeremiah that he knew him before he was born (Jer.1:5) and that Jeremiah and the whole nation of Israel, were precious to him (Jer.31:3b, “I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself.”) We are victorious through our prayers and faithfulness to God no matter what the outcome is. When we obey God, even if others reject God (as unbelievers) or reject the healing God offers them (as believers) we are still victorious. How? We are victorious because we are faithful and obedient.
And the believers who die this way will know we loved them, here on earth, and in heaven when they die. They will have perfect knowledge in heaven, so they will know how much we cared and how much we prayed for them. They are not in heaven resenting us for not doing more for them. They are rejoicing in Jesus’ love. They are at peace. And Jesus accepted them in their weakened state, which is no longer weak in heaven.
The hardest part in having a loved one (someone older) fall into depression is the inability to change that person. Again, if the person is young, we must fight and engage a professional to help us to help them. Always we can pray, and we should. We can listen or offer help. If that person attempts suicide, we can intervene and have professionals help them. But if the person is older and just seems to be withering away, we may have to let them go. We fight. We pray, but at times we also accept and release the other person. This is not sinning. We must release the false guilt that tells us we have sinned by not trying to force the despondent person to change his or her mind. We love this person as best we can. We speak words of hope, encouragement and kindness. But then we allow this person to decide if she (or he) wants to fight or to surrender to death. When this person is a believer, she will see her Lord when she does die.
This has been a hard post to write, but it has been a concern on my mind, because I only recently found out about my Ohio friend’s death. I want to offer comfort to those who have experienced this with their friends too. I want to help release all of us from the false guilt that says we neglected our loved one. God gives us a free choice, and even if our loved one makes what we consider to be a poor choice (becoming despondent and giving up) we must honor her choice. As a believer, she will still go to heaven.
May the Lord bless you this week with joy and peace. Thanks for joining us in this post.