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DAY 15
Thinking of quitting? Don’t!

Stand firm’ 1 Corinthians 15:58 NIV

GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL was a musical prodigy. At twenty-one he was a keyboard virtuoso. When he turned to composing he gained immediate fame and soon was appointed Kapellmeister to the Elector of Hanover (later King George I of England). When Handel moved to England his renown grew. By the time he was forty he was world famous. But despite his talent and fame he faced considerable adversity. Rivalry with English composers was fierce. Audiences were fickle; sometimes they didn’t turn out for his performances. He was the victim of the changing political winds. Several times he found himself on the verge of bankruptcy. His problems were compounded by failing health. He suffered a stroke which left his right arm limp and damaged the use of four fingers in his right hand. Although he recovered, it left him battling depression. Finally, at fifty-six, Handel decided it was time to retire. Discouraged, miserable and consumed with debt, he felt certain he’d land in a debtor’s prison. So on April 8, 1741, he gave what he considered his farewell concert. Disappointed and filled with self-pity, he gave up. But that year something incredible happened. A wealthy friend named Charles Jennings encouraged Handel by visiting him and giving him a libretto based on the life of Christ. The work intrigued Handel, so he began writing. Immediately the floodgates of inspiration opened. For three weeks he wrote almost nonstop. Then he spent another two days creating the orchestrations. In twenty-four days he had completed the 260-page manuscript of The Messiah. Thinking of quitting? Don’t! Be steadfast.

Prayer Point - Loved ones
Father God, You made me to be a blessing, and I want to bless those around me, yet when depression is overwhelming, I feel as though I drag people down and make life harder for them. Thank You for the friends and family who stick with me through the tough times. Help me find ways to show them how much I love and appreciate them, even when depression clouds my vIew.

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DAY 16
Getting past your past

But forget all that... For I am about to do something new’ Isaiah 43:18-19 NLT'

DID YOU KNOW that Abraham Lincoln lost several elections before finally becoming one of America’s greatest presidents? In fact, he failed so often it was amazing he kept trying. Did you know that the material used to make Kleenex tissues was invented as a gas mask filter during World War I and it failed? Then when inventors tried to make it into skin cream it flopped again. Finally they repackaged it as disposable handkerchiefs, and guess what; people buy 200 billion of them annually. Not bad for a product that bombed twice! You can’t seize your future while you’re obsessing over your past. So learn from it and let it go. Heed the advice of author Susan Scott: ‘My dog and cat have taught me a great lesson in life: learn to shed a lot!’ Nobody starts out being good at everything. Tackling new ventures usually means learning by trial and error. When Charles Darrow got married he promised his wife they’d become millionaires. But the Great Depression came and they ended up hitting rock bottom. Darrow was ready to give up his dream but his wife encouraged him to keep going. Then one day he devised the idea of using ‘play money’ to buy ‘pretend properties,’ and he turned his vision into a board game with little houses and hotels. It’s called Monopoly, and Parker Brothers bought it from Darrow for, you’ve guessed it, a million dollars! Remember, when you’re on the right track and you refuse to give up, God can do something great through you. So keep going and don’t look back.

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DAY 17
LET IT GO!

'God has made me forget all my troubles’ Genesis 41:51 NLT'

LET GO of what others have done to you! Thorns come with roses, and hurts come with human relationships. And few hurts go as deeply as those inflicted by friends and family. Ask Joseph, who was sold out by his brothers and locked up in a foreign prison for a crime he never committed. It’s the stuff bitterness, depression, despair and defeat are made of. And who’d have blamed him? But Joseph knew that he, not his abusers, had the last word; that he, not they, would decide his future. Others can wound you, but no one can destroy you without your permission and cooperation. It’s not what they do to you that determine your outcomes, it’s what you do next. Joseph decided to let the offenses go and accept responsibility for his own reactions. When you do that you take back your power, open yourself to new options, and make choices that position you to come out of it stronger, wiser and more blessed. Notice: a) Joseph saw it from God’s perspective. ‘God sent me… to save your lives by a great deliverance… it was not you who sent me here’ (Genesis 45:7-8 NIV) b) he released his resentment. He moved beyond it and ministered to the needs of those who had hurt him c) he refused to become a victim of other people’s actions. As a result God made him ruler over all Egypt d) he prepared for the future. How? By excelling in his prophetic and administrative gifts, even though imprisoned (Genesis 41). So, choose to see it God’s way. Let it go. Do what you’ve been called to do, and watch God vindicate you royally!

Prayer Point - Medical help
Lord of Love, You are in charge of my healing, and I give thanks to You for everyone and everything You are using to heal me. Thank you for the privilege of living in a country where medical professionals acknowledge the existence of depression and know how to treat it. Thank you for drugs which can help to rebalance the brain. Give me courage to seek medical help when I need it.

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DAY 18
Conquering depression
‘Let my soul be at rest again, for the LORD has been good to me’ Psalm 116:7 NLT

WHEN YOU ARE DEPRESSED your motivation is drained, your desire to pursue God is gone, your conversations turn sour, you’re blinded to your blessings, your enthusiasm is forced, you’re in a daze regarding future plans. What’s the way out? Find the cause of your depression! Unconfessed sin is like a stone in your shoe. Get it out! No vacation, job change, relationship change, or doctor will heal it: ‘Your iniquities have separated you from your God’ (Isaiah 59:2 NIV). Greed can depress you too. King Ahab’s obsession with Naboth’s vineyard affected his entire family: ‘The greedy bring ruin to their households’ (Proverbs 15:27 NIV). Constantly comparing yourself to others can also depress you. So can finding fault. ‘Those who guard their mouths… keep themselves from calamity’ (Proverbs 21:23 NIV). So can an unforgiving attitude. Fatigue is also a major cause. One US President refused to make important decisions at the end of the day, insisting that rest was necessary to exercising good judgement. As great as their assignment was, Jesus often called His disciples aside to rest. He knew that when fatigue walks in, faith walks out. So how can you conquer depression? a) through prayer! Oswald J Smith said that the happiest moments of his life were during prayer and Bible reading. He called this his ‘morning watch.’ He also said praying aloud prevented his thoughts from wandering b) through God’s Word! Jeremiah said, ‘When your words came, I ate them; they were my joy and my heart’s delight’ (Jeremiah 15:16 NIV). Daily prayer and the reading of God’s Word is a prescription that can help heal your emotions and lift your depression. Try it!

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DAY 19
All you need is a seed!

'If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, “move” …and it will’ Matthew 17:20 NIV'


WHEN YOU’RE BATTLING a mountain of sickness, debt, loneliness or depression, it’s easy to harbour self-defeating expectations about how things will turn out, based on your past experiences. Also, because we live in an ‘unbelieving and perverse generation’ (Matthew 17:17 NIV), it means constantly fighting the defeatist attitudes of our culture, media, the educational system, the workplace, and even our friends. Unless you recognise this it can wear you down by diluting and polluting your faith. That’s why you need to feed your faith daily on God’s Word. Notice, Jesus isn’t referring here to a mountain you encountered years ago, or some future issue. No. He said, ‘say to this mountain’. He wants you to exercise your faith today! again: ‘if you have faith as small as a mustard seed... nothing will be impossible’ (Matthew 17:20 NIV). A mustard seed’s so miniscule it can get stuck between your teeth! Yet the Bible says that although it’s ‘the least of all the seeds’, under the right conditions it can grow into a tree big enough for the birds to nest in (Matthew 13:32). God-given faith is like a sleeping giant within each of us. When it awakens, miracles happen. If you’ve one atom of faith left, you have what you need to prevail. But this kind of faith only works when it becomes the language you speak and the attitude you maintain. The enemy doesn’t want you to know that, because when you do, you won’t just think about what’s happening, you’ll think about what’s possible!

Listen Prayer Point - Numbness
Jesus, You have opened the way for me to live life in all its fullness, and yet so often depression leaves me feeling cold and numb. I know that this numbness is a natural protection system within me, but I would so love to feel again. By Your Spirit, please work in me today, thawing me enough so that I can enjoy a little taste of life without being overwhelmed.

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DAY 20
Push!
‘I press on toward the goal’ Philippians 3:14 NIV

WHEN YOU COMMIT to bringing forth all that God has placed within you, you may have to push against everything everybody ever did to you, or said about you. You may have to battle against years of suppression, oppression, and depression. You may have to push in order to release the treasure God’s placed inside you. He’ll help you bring it out, but it’s up to you to push. In fact, it may not happen if you don’t. But what do we push against? Against satanic attacks in all their debilitating forms, such as bad memories, low self-esteem, feelings of unworthiness. The devil may have spent years pushing you aside, pulling you back, putting you down, but today God is saying to you, ‘I want to open you up, I want to empower you to give birth to that which I’ve placed within you.’ The time has come for you to rise up and say, ‘It’s my turn to conceive, for the treasure within me to come forth, for me to be loosed to do what God created me to do.’ When a baby’s born, everything in the family changes. The same is true for you. When you give birth to what God’s placed within you, everything around you will be affected. God’s blessing is an overflowing blessing and it’ll touch every area of your life. Every woman knows when she’s pregnant. The same is true in the spiritual realm. Don’t fail to give birth to what God has put in you. Now is the time for the treasure to come forth. So push!

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DAY 21
Dealing with depression
‘Anxiety in the heart of man causes depression’ Proverbs 12:25 NKJ



LONG-TERM DEPRESSION drains your energy, distorts your reality, assaults your faith and affects everybody around you. One in five of us suffers from it. It’s responsible for more workplace absenteeism than diabetes and heart disease. Poor health can cause it, not to mention your surroundings; also stress, fear, loneliness, guilt and anger. And it’s no modern-day disease either; it affected Bible characters too. 1) David experienced it because of unconfessed sin. Listen: ‘I am... utterly crushed... my strength fails... My friends... stay far away’ (Psalm 38:8-11 NIV). 2) Job got so depressed about his financial, personal and family losses that he cursed the day he was born. (Job 3:1-3). 3) When Jezebel threatened Elijah, he went through the ‘H.A.L.T.’ syndrome. He was Hungry; he stopped eating. Angry; he got mad at God and the world. Lonely; he left his servant and went off by himself. Tired; he collapsed. But God had a prescription. He: a) changed his diet b) told him to rest c) let him know he wasn’t alone d) sent an angel to minister to him. Those are still the steps out of depression! David said, ‘The Lord... lifted me up out of the pit of despair’ (Psalm 40:1-2 NLT) and He can bring you out of your depression too! Don’t isolate yourself and don’t be ashamed to get help from your pastor, a trusted friend or a good counsellor. And remember, addictive behaviour and destructive relationships will only make things worse. The moment Elijah heard God’s voice, he began ‘getting it together’. With God’s help, you can too!


Prayer Point - Anger and disappointment
Lord God, I confess that I feel angry – angry with You, angry with the world and angry with myself. I never asked for depression, and this isn’t how I wanted my life to turn out. Yet I don’t want to be consumed with bitterness. Please give me Your grace today to forgive where I need to forgive, and to entrust the pieces of my broken dreams into Your healing hands.

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DAY 22

The ‘I-Only’ Syndrome
‘And I, I only, am left’ 1 Kings 19:10 AMP
DEPRESSION convinced Elijah that nobody else was as badly off as him. He felt ‘terminally unique.’ We all go through it. Behind your neighbour’s smile, or the nameplate on your boss’s door, there are struggles they can’t talk about. So they live in quiet despair. Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘We may have arrived on different ships, but we’re all in the same boat now.’ Paul wrote, ‘No test or temptation... is beyond the course of what others have had to face. All you need to remember is that God will never let you down; He’ll never let you be pushed past your limit; He’ll always be there to help you come through it’ (1 Corinthians 10:13 TM). Before every crown there’s a cross. Bunyan wrote Pilgrim’s Progress in prison. Florence Nightingale, too ill to move from bed, reorganised the hospitals of England. Louis Pasteur, semiparalysed by apoplexy, was tireless in his attack on disease. Francis Parkman couldn’t work for more than five minutes at a time. His eyesight was so bad that he could only scrawl gigantic words on a manuscript. Yet he wrote twenty magnificent volumes of history. You’re not unique! And you’re not alone! Listen: ‘Nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable – absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love’ (Rom 8:38-39 TM). What more could you ask for!

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DAY 23
How to move the mountain
‘[Say] to this mountain, “Be removed”’ Mark 11:23 NKJ

HOW CAN YOU move the mountain in your life? By: 1) Using God’s Word: In the wilderness satan tempted Jesus in three ways: a) put your temporal needs ahead of your spiritual ones: ‘Turn these stones into bread’ b) use your power for the wrong reasons: ‘Throw yourself down from the pinnacle of the temple’ c) take the easy way, not the cross: ‘The world is yours, just submit to me.’ Each time Jesus overcame satan by saying, ‘It is written’ (Matthew 4:1-11 NIV). Your most powerful weapon is God’s Word – learn to use it! 2) Being persistent: Jeremiah said that God’s Word is ‘like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces’ (Jeremiah 23:29 NIV). Ever wonder how a hammer can hit a rock ninety-nine times, but on the one-hundredth blow it shatters? That’s because all the previous blows kept weakening it. Live in God’s Word; keep speaking it over your situation and it will work. 3) Forgiving: The story is told of a pastor who asked his congregation, ‘How many of you are willing to forgive your enemies?’ Everybody was except one old guy. ‘Why not?’ the pastor asked. He replied, ‘Because I have none; I’ve outlived them all!’ After speaking about mountain-moving faith and prayer that bring results, Jesus said, ‘when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins’ (Mark 11:25 NKJV). Your mountain can’t be moved or your prayers answered if you’re harbouring unforgiveness. So ask yourself, ‘Is it worth it?’ Whether you think the offender deserves forgiveness or not, for your own sake, forgive it and let it go.


Prayer Point - Bleak future
God of the ages, I ask for Your help today. When I look at my future, I feel nothing but fear and disillusionment, and that makes it hard to plan ahead, yet I have decisions to make. Though my vision may be clouded with hopelessness, give me unblocked ears so that I can hear You telling me what You want me to do next. Then please give me strength to obey.

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DAY 24
Stay focused on Jesus
‘When he saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified and began to sink’ Matthew 14:30 NLT

EVER NOTICED how cartoon characters have the uncanny ability to run off cliffs without falling? As long as they keep pumping, their legs can run just as well in the air as on the ground. But as soon as they look at their circumstances, they panic and start to plummet. Going off the cliff doesn’t stop them – looking down does! As long as Peter focused on the Saviour he’d no problems, but when he focused on the storm, fear took him under. Faith held him up, fear took him down. And it’ll take you down, too! When Moses sent 12 scouts to the Promised Land to check out the enemy, 10 came back saying, ‘They’re like giants; we’d better close up shop and go home!’ But the other two said, ‘No problem, with God’s help we can whip them.’ Faced with identical circumstances, some people lose heart, while others take heart. Which are you? David was bringing supplies to his brothers in the army when he heard about Goliath, a man so big he’d have qualified for World Wrestling Federation! Nobody would take him on. But David announced, ‘The battle is the Lord’s’ (1 Samuel 17:47 NIV), then proceeded to bring him down with a rag and a rock. When you shift your focus off Jesus, you’re like a steelworker on scaffolding looking down from 500 feet up; you suddenly panic and lose your grip. God hasn’t called you to fall; He’s given you the ability to stand, if you just keep focused on Him!