Comforting Others with the Comfort We Receive
The Puritan Pastor, Timothy Rogers, lived from 1658-1728. Rogers was a godly and competent pastor. On at least two occasions, each lasting an extended period of time, Rogers was overwhelmed by severe depression.
Archibald Alexander (1772-1851), the first professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, wrote that Roger’s depression was so acute that “he gave up all hope of mercy of God and believed himself to be a vessel of wrath” (Thoughts on Religious Experience, 1844/1978, 35).
Due to his own struggle with severe depression, Rogers became committed to ministering to others who experienced depression. As part of his ministry, Rogers wrote A Discourse on Trouble of Mind and the Disease of Melancholy. Alexander was so impressed with Rogers’s work, that he included the Preface verbatim in his own work Thoughts on Religious Experience.
Lesson #1: Depression Is an Embodied-Soul Condition
Speaking from his own battles with depression and from his biblical-theological-pastoral training, Rogers explains the complex body-soul interconnection involved in depression.
“The faculties of the soul are weakened, and all their operations disturbed and clouded: and the poor body languishes and pines away at the same time…. It is in every respect sad and overwhelming, a state of darkness that has no discernable beams of light. It generally begins in the body and then conveys venom to the mind” (emphasis added).
Rogers advises pastors and friends to take the counsel of skilled physicians, “and especially to such doctors who have experienced something of depression themselves.” Wisely, Rogers notes that there is danger,
“That the bodily physician will look no further than the body, while the spiritual physician will totally disregard the body, and look only at the mind” (emphasis added).
Speaking of the feelings, thoughts, and words of the “melancholy man,” Rogers adds that,
“Many of these are as natural consequences of bodily disease, as the symptoms of a fever, which the poor sufferer can no more avoid, than the sick man can keep himself from sighing and groaning. Many will say to such a one, ‘Why do you so pore over your case and thus gratify the devil?’ Whereas it is the very nature of the disease to cause such fixed musings. You might as well say to a man in a fever, ‘Why are you not well, why will you be sick?’”
Lesson #2: Compassionate Care for the Sufferer
Reminiscent of Galatians 6:1, Rogers encourages us to:
“Treat those who are under this disease with tender compassion. Remember also that you are liable to the same affliction; for however brisk your spirits and lively your feelings now, you may meet with such reverses, with such long and sharp afflictions, as will sink your spirits” (emphasis added).
Quoting the laments of Job and David, Pastor Rogers urges caregivers not to express surprise at “anything the melancholy person might say.” Their “soul is sore vexed” and they “say with David, ‘I am weary with my groaning: all the night make I my bed to swim. I water my couch with my tears.’ They cannot forebear to groan and weep more, until their very eyes be consumed with grief.” Rogers then summarizes his counsel to counselors:
“Let no sharp words of theirs provoke you to talk sharply to them. It would be a great weakness in you not to bear with them.”
Lesson #3: Comforting Care for Depression—Confronting Job’s Miserable Comforters
Reminiscent of Job 16, Rogers confronts those who would confront the person struggling with depression.
“Never use harsh language to your friends when under the disease of melancholy. This will only serve to fret and perplex them the more, but will never benefit them. I know that the counsel of some is to rebuke and chide them on all occasions; but I dare confidently say that such advisors never felt the disease themselves” (emphasis added).
Rogers rebukes those who accuse people struggling with depression of sinfully clinging to their depression.
“Some indeed suppose that the melancholy hug their disease, and are unwilling to give it up, but you might as well suppose that a man would be pleased with lying on a bed of thorns, or in a fiery furnace.” (emphasis added).
Lesson #4: Focus on Encouragement Over Exhortation
As a wise and caring soul physician, Rogers equips others to care like Christ. “Do not urge your melancholy friends to do what is out of their power. They are like persons whose bones are broken, and who are incapacitated for action.”
Astute enough to imagine the negative response his statement might receive, Rogers adds, “But you will ask, ought we not to urge them to hear the Word of God?”
Rogers responds to his own question by noting that the soul physician must know well the particular person they are counseling. He says to “kindly and gently” encourage them, if they are able, to “attend the preaching of the Word; but beware of using a peremptory and violent method.”
Rogers then illustrates his suggested approach using a situation well-known in his day.
“The method pursued by John Dod with Mrs. Drake should be imitated. ‘The burden which overloaded her soul was so great, that we never durst add any thereunto, but fed her with all encouragements, she being too apt to overcharge herself, and to despair upon any addition of fuel to that fire which was inwardly consuming her.’”
Lesson #5: Pray Empathetically for the Sufferer
Rogers then adds, “the next thing which you are to do for your melancholy friends is to pray for them.” Why and what type of prayers?
“As they have not light and composure to pray for themselves, let your eyes weep for them in secret, and there let your souls melt in fervent holy prayers.”
Rogers also urges, “nor only pray for them yourself, but engage other Christian friends also to pray for them.” Pastor Rogers then shares his own testimony.
“I myself have been greatly helped by the prayers of others, and I heartily thank all those who set apart particular days to remember at a throne of grace my distressed condition.”
Lesson #6: Offer Gospel-Centered, Christ-Focused Care
In all his counsel, Pastor Rogers points to Christ.
“Put your poor afflicted friends in mind, continually, of the sovereign grace of God in Jesus Christ. Often impress on their minds that He is merciful and gracious, that as far as the heavens are above the earth, so far are His thoughts above their thoughts; His thoughts of mercy above their self-condemning, guilty thoughts” (emphasis added).
Hear that again: help those struggling with depression by impressing on their minds that God’s thoughts of mercy are infinitely above their self-condemning thoughts.
Rogers continues, “Teach them as much as you can, to look unto God, by the great mediator, for grace and strength, and not too much to pore over their own souls, where there is so much darkness and unbelief.”
Pastor Rogers’s Concluding Counsel
Rogers ends with these words,
“From my own experience, I can testify that the mild and gentle way of dealing with such is the best.”
Join the Conversation
Which of Pastor Rogers’s words of counsel for counseling those struggling with depression most resonate with you? Why?
What could biblical counselors, pastors, and friends, learn today from the words of Pastor Rogers?
Are there any aspects of Pastor Rogers’s counsel that you would word differently, add to, or disagree with? If so, what would you say differently?
