The Potential Good in Putting Our Worst Foot Forward
By Scott Sauls
affliction

One day in my mid-20s while studying at Covenant Seminary to become a pastor, I came across a suicide note published in the local newspaper … written by a pastor:

God forgive me for not being any stronger than I am. But when a minister becomes clinically depressed, there are very few places where he can turn to for help … it feels as if I’m sinking farther and farther into a downward spiral of depression. I feel like a drowning man, trying frantically to lift up my head to take just one more breath. But one way or another, I know I am going down.

The writer was the promising young pastor of a large, thriving Presbyterian church in St. Louis. Having secretly battled depression for a long time — and having sought help through prayer, therapy, and medication — his will to claw through yet another day was gone. In his darkest hour, the young pastor decided he would rather join the angels than continue facing demons for years to come. The signoff to his note, “Yours in the Name of Our Blessed Lord, Our Only Hope in Life and Death,” brought a strange comfort, because grace covers all types of sins, including self-harm and suicide. Yet grief and confusion remained.

The confusion escalated when another pastor, also from St. Louis, asphyxiated himself to death because of a similar, secret depression.

The news of these two suicides rocked my world. How could these men — both gifted pastors who believed in Jesus, preached grace, and comforted others with gospel hope — end up losing hope for themselves?

Since that time, two more pastor friends of mine have taken their own lives — one of them also from St. Louis and the other from Nashville, Tennessee.

For as long as I had been a Christian, I had also heard a teaching — which I came to understand as unbiblical and very destructive — that being a Christian and being depressed and suicidal aren’t supposed to go together. “Light always drives out darkness,” these teachers would say. “When you’re believing the right things, peace and joy will necessarily follow.” Based on these ideas, a worship song was released that became very popular among evangelical Christians. The lyrics included the confident declaration that “In His presence, our problems disappear.”

But when the real world hits, such teachings and songs hurt a lot more than they help. We are talking about flawed but faithful pastors who prayed and read their Bibles every day, who served their churches and cities and counseled people and preached grace, and who ended their own lives … because in His presence, their problems did not disappear.

Affliction, God’s Kindness, and Me

I, too, have from time to time faced the demons of affliction, especially in the form of anxiety and depression. Most of the time, thankfully, this struggle has been more low-grade than intense. On one occasion, though, it flattened me — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

I could not fall asleep for two weeks straight. Even sleeping pills couldn’t calm the adrenaline and knock me out, which only made things worse. In the evenings, I feared the quiet, knowing I was in for another all-night battle with insomnia that I was likely to lose. The sunrise also scared me as an unwelcome reminder that another day of impossible struggle was ahead. I lost 15% of my body weight in two months. I could not concentrate. I found no comfort in God’s promises from Scripture. I couldn’t bring myself to pray anything but “Please help me,” and “Please end this.”

Our afflictions may be the key to our fruitfulness as carriers of Jesus’ love. What feels like the scent of death to us may end up becoming the scent of life for others.

According to a study by Thom Rainer, circumstance-triggered melancholy hits ministers at a disproportionally higher rate than the general populace. Due to the unique pressures associated with spiritual warfare, unrealistic expectations from congregants and oneself, growing platforms for unaccountable criticism and gossip toward and about ministers (especially in the digital age), failure to take time off for rest and replenishment, marriage difficulties, financial strains, and the problem of comparison to other ministers and ministries, Rainer concludes that ministers are set up as prime candidates for descent into an emotional abyss. 

The pastors who committed suicide did so because they could not imagine navigating the emotional abyss for another day. They also suffered their afflictions in silence, for fear of being rejected. The one who left the suicide note said that if a pastor tells anyone about his depression, he will lose his ministry. People don’t want to be pastored, taught, or led by a damaged person.

Or do they?

Maybe instead of labeling anxious and depressed people as “damaged goods,” we should learn from the Psalms and Jesus and Paul about the biblical theology of weakness. Maybe we should start learning how to apply that theology in our lives as well as in the lives of those who are called to lead us. Even the Apostle Paul said that it is in weakness that we experience the glory, power, and grace of God. This is how God works.

God is upside-down to our sensibilities.

Better said, we are upside-down to his.

Solidarity With Giants

I once heard someone say that it’s OK to realize that you are crazy and damaged, because all of the best people are. Suffering has a way of equipping us to be the best expressions of God’s compassion and grace. It has a way of equipping us to love and lead in ways that are helpful and not harmful. A healer who has not been wounded is extremely limited in her/his ability to heal. As noted grief expert Elisabeth Kübler-Ross has said:

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.

In Scripture, the “crazy, very damaged,” beautiful people are the ones through whom God did the greatest things. Hannah had bitterness of soul over infertility and a broken domestic situation. Elijah felt so beaten down that he asked God to take his life. Job and Jeremiah cursed the day that they were born. David interrogated his own soul as to why it was so downcast. Even Jesus, the perfectly divine human, lamented that His soul was overwhelmed with sorrow. He wept when His friend died.

Each of these biblical saints was uniquely empowered by God to change the world — not in spite of affliction, but because of and through affliction.

Church history tells a similar story. Charles Spurgeon, the prince of preachers, was depressed during many of his best ministry years. William Cowper, the great hymn writer, had crippling anxiety for most of his adult life. Van Gogh checked into an insane asylum and created some of his best paintings there. C.S. Lewis lost his wife to cancer and fell apart emotionally. Joni Eareckson Tada became paralyzed as a teenager and, for a time, became deeply depressed. Ann Voskamp has written candidly and often about her own emotional battles and scars. John Perkins was almost beaten to death repeatedly. Tim Keller contracted incurable cancer.

Such afflicted souls are among the instruments God has chosen to bring truth, beauty, grace, and hope into the world. The best therapists and counselors have themselves been in therapy and counseling. It’s how God works.

If you experience affliction or melancholy or hurt of any kind, I am sharing this part of my story to remind you that there is no shame in bearing affliction. In fact, our afflictions may be the key to our fruitfulness as carriers of Jesus’ love. What feels like the scent of death to us may end up becoming the scent of life for others as we learn to comfort others in their affliction with the comfort that we, in our affliction, have received from God. I’ll never forget when Rick Warren eulogized his son Matthew, who from a desperate place took his own life. Rick said that Matthew was proof positive that broken trees bear the best fruit. It was not in spite of his affliction, but through his affliction, that Matthew’s life brought gospel hope to many strugglers.

In my darkest hour, in those months of facing into the abyss, two people put themselves on permanent call for me. These two carried me day and night, with constant reminders that though I was down, I was not out. Though I was afraid, I was not alone. Though I had to face some demons, I was surrounded by an angelic presence. Perhaps these two, also, were my guardian angels.

These two were my brother Matt, and my wife, Patti. Both were outstanding healers because both had suffered with anxiety and depression, too.

Afflicted does not mean ineffective.

Damaged does not mean done.

A Christian’s affliction can also, ironically, become an occasion for hope. After I had been serving as pastor at Christ Presbyterian Church in Nashville, Tennessee, about two years, one of our members told me that he thinks I am a good preacher and that he is entirely unimpressed by this. He told me that the moment he decided to trust me, the moment he decided that I was his pastor, was when I told the whole church that I have struggled emotionally and that I have been in counseling for many years.

Nearly all of the Psalms — and nearly the entire Bible, for that matter — were written from dark, depressed, wrecked, and restless places.

Then it dawned on me. As a pastor and as a man, my afflictions may end up having greater impact than my preaching or my vision ever will. In the end, it may be that the best fruit that came from ministry was not from the times I put my best foot forward, but rather the times I put my worst foot forward.

It is also helpful to remember that nearly all of the Psalms — and nearly the entire Bible, for that matter — were written from dark, depressed, wrecked, and restless places.

An Invitation to Rest

Our pain is also an invitation into Sabbath rest. When you are laid flat and there’s nothing you can do except beg for help, Jesus is eager to meet you in that place. It is from there that He summons the weary and heavy-laden and the wrecked and restless to come to Him and learn from Him, to see and savor His humility and gentleness of heart … that we might find rest for our souls (Matthew 11:28-30).

For an afflicted body or soul, there is nothing quite like an easy yoke and a light burden under which to process the pain.

Often anxiety and depression have come upon me as I have lost my way. Instead of resting in Jesus, I have sought validation from the crowds, wanting fans instead of friends, wanting to make a name for myself instead of making the name of Jesus famous. This is always a dead-end street, but there are times when my heart still goes there.

Affliction has been God’s way of reminding me that I don’t have to be awesome. He has not called me to be awesome, or well-liked, or a famous celebrity. He has foremost called me to be loved, to be receptive to His love, and to find my rest in His love. He has called me to remember that because of Jesus, I already have a name. I will be remembered and celebrated and sung over even after I am long gone, because He is my God and I am His person. He is my Father, and I am His son. And on that day into eternity, there will be no more death, mourning, crying, or pain.

As the little girl once recited for her Sunday School teacher, “The Lord is my Shepherd; that’s all I want.” Sometimes the misquotes are the best and truest quotes, yes?

Philosopher and theologian Søren Kierkegaard once said that the thorn in his foot enabled him to spring higher than anyone with sound feet. The Apostle Paul said something similar about the thorn in his flesh. The thorn kept him from becoming prideful. It kept him humble. It kept him fit for God and fit for the people whom God had called him to love and serve. There is glory in weakness. There is a power that is made perfect in that place (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).

Though I would not wish emotional pain or melancholy on anyone, I am strangely thankful for the unique way that this affliction has led me, time and again, back into the rest of God.

As my friend and mentor Tim Keller is fond of saying…

All you need is nothing. All you need is need.


Scott Sauls is senior pastor of Christ Presbyterian Church in Nashville, Tennessee. The article is adapted from latest book, “Beautiful People Don’t Just Happen: How God Redeems Regret, Hurt, and Fear in the Making of Better Humans (June 14, 2022, Zondervan). 

Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

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