Rev. Barnhart,
I thought I would attempt to set forth my position on this a bit more carefully, in case this thread takes off. I only touched on medication briefly in that post because the thread itself was on demons, and the havoc that they can wreak in the life of a believer. I am not making a blanket statement that pills are never necessary. However, I think I am comfortable in my opinion that many antidepressants, psychotropics, etc., aim to lop off the heads of a hydra without burning the root and killing the beast. And I wouldn't even restrict the causes of mental illnesses to demonic entities. Human sin, false doctrine, and false beliefs can also play a part in the ultimate destruction and degradation of a human mind.
I do not envy the role of a pastor in trying to determine or evaluate whether a person is suffering from biological imbalance, error in their cognitive structure of beliefs, pangs of conscience and Fatherly chastening, or demonic and Satanic harassment. I'm not in any way trying to suggest that the issues are simple. They are very complex.
I also see the force of your analogy to physical medication for headaches and what not. For my part, the issue with antidepressants, psychotropics, etc., is that the
line between the "mind" and the "spirit" is so very thin. I know that we are not Gnostics, and I know that we will be clothed in glorified bodies forever. I know that this body, in some sense, is "me". I am a unified whole. Nevertheless, I think most people on this board would be able to draw a fast and easy distinction between their foot and their soul, or their hand and their soul. Even the word "soul" is itself problematic. I'm sure there are people on here who exegetically take that merely as "life". So at the end of the day, we have this handful of words, "spirit", "soul", "self", "mind", "psyche", "ego", that we deal with it, and its a lot more difficult to draw a line of demarcation between the "brain" and the spirit-soul-self, than it is to draw a line between the ankle and the spirit-soul-self.
If that line could be effectively and Biblically drawn, then I think the solution to this whole question would be easier. So I suppose I'm not denying in principle that medications can and should be used. I guess I just have a large amount of skepticism as to how we can distinguish between the brain and the spirit of a man.
That being said, I also think that there can be "structural" causes of mental illness. That is, if your mind is an infrastructure of many beliefs, each of them forming pillars, rails, scaffolding, etc., if you have ingested many false beliefs, lies, false religion, etc., then your mind will of necessity grate against the objective reality of God's world, and there will be psychic friction.
For example: What happens to a person when they participate in Satan's Inversion. That's how I think of Satan's work on this planet and in human beings. He seeks to invert everything about God's world and God's order. Men marrying men; women slaughtering their children; the chain of "authority" from serpent -> Eve -> Adam, instead of Adam -> Eve -> animals. We see this in false religions. "Everything is
maya; everything is illusion."
That thought seems "trippy" to most adolescent young adults studying Hinduism and the Upanishads, but in reality its a proposition of the Inversion that will destroy their mind. No person ingests that thought and takes it seriously; hence the oft-quoted quip of Buddhists looking both ways before they cross the street. People in America who read Eastern philosophy don't doubt that they have a mother and father to visit; they don't doubt that their friends are really there; they don't doubt that their bodies are real; they "know" that they aren't living in a computer simulation simply because God has hardwired those "properly basic beliefs" into their spirit-mind.
But they accept that because it gives them a perceived liberty and autonomy. All that to say this: What happens when they really start to believe that one day? What happens when they lose all ability to trust the ground that they walk on, the doors that they see, the people speaking to them? What happens when the demonic philosophy they toy with becomes the backbone of their epistemology? Its a practical solipsism that many people would label schizophrenia. Maybe there are even some biological cursors that would take place under the extreme stress of believing that you and you alone existed, and everything else was the result of your will, and that everything reflected you.
Solipsism is, in a sense, man receiving what he has always wished for, namely, that everything be about him, and yet when he receives it, he is, for all intents and purposes, in Hell.
The same thing is true of the yin-yang. People ingest it and think that there is a core of darkness in all light, and a core of light in all darkness. Really? Think about what that will do to the human mind when it comes to actually believe that, fundamentally, child molestation and summer-time walks, or family dinners, are of the same essence.
Think about the minds of America: The minds of men are steeped in television and video games as they grow up in broken families. They are out of touch with even the grand rhythms of nature. The rising and setting of the sun no longer determines the rising and setting of people. We don't go outside. We are unfamiliar with rain cycles and agricultural cycles. The minds of young men are bathed in a steady dose of free pornography from the time they are twelve and thirteen and have a computer. They are taught the truths of evolution, that everything has no meaning, that there is no meaning, that they are an accident, that good and evil is simply an illusion, that men should be with men, and women with women, and children and the elderly should be done away with. Then they take this mindset and start reading Eastern philosophy. "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Seems so deep and profound, when in reality it is just demonic irrationality aiming to make men as irrational and imbalanced as possible. Maybe then they read Burroughs or Derrida and lose all confidence in language altogether. Augment that with various psychedelic, consciousness-expanding drugs and concourse with spirits, and you have a significant portion of the American populace, if not in yesteryear, at least today.
The endgame of this demonic strategy and human sin is to make the mind like a soaking wet paper towel. It might be able to hold a couple of pennies, but eventually its going to tear. And the mind can only ingest and live and breathe in so much foolishness and sin before it eventually tears.
I realize I'm speaking to extreme cases. To get back to the heart of this thread, I think many modern Americans, regardless of the root causes, would look at such a person whose mind had torn and ripped right down the middle, and was just a fractured mess, and trust the DSM-IV that this was just "schizophrenia" or something of the like.
"Naming" something has power. God created and gave names. Adam and Eve were to give names to the animals. We give a "name" that really just means "split mind" to some horrible remnants of humanity we have encountered, and it gives us a sense of assurance that we have diagnosed and contained that insanity.
Now, maybe there are chemical markers once a mind has been ripped, or fallen apart. Maybe the serotonin is all out of balance and warped. My only point is, what's the
root cause?
Why are the chemicals so messed up?
Now, maybe some medications can and do rebalance the neural net. But I imagine that in some cases that would be similar to the house "being swept" without a new Guest moving in, and the latter case of that person may well be worse than the first.
Or take demons. Perhaps everything I've said so far has been hogwash. Yet, moving on to demons, I do think that we see a bit of "Reformed Deism" in America today. Perhaps this is an overreaction to Pentecostalism and the charismatic movement; we so closely associate "special revelation" with "miracles", and then so closely associate "miracles" with "demons", since they are both supernatural, that in our rejection of the charismatic movement, we practically reject demons also.
Personally, I don't think the Christian church has ever failed to take these entities very seriously. It would seem as if even the Puritans took them far more seriously than we Christians on the other side of the Industrial Revolution do.
Gurnall speaks of Satan's servants who lie on his breast, just like John rested in the bosom of Christ; I believe William Ames spoke of the devil working wonders to impress some of his servants; I'm sure Cotton Mather had a different opinion of demonic workings than many on this board.
And if you know people in the drug culture, in neo-paganism, in Wicca, in Asatru, there are things that go on, and experiences that happen. There is "traffick" between humans and demonic entities. Leaving aside those involved in that, demons are always shown to be the enemies of the saints. What happened to the man in the Corinthian church when he was "turned over" to Satan? What happened when Satan "sifted Peter" as wheat? What is it to wrestle in hand to hand combat? What is it to battle a roaring lion, without ever taking one's armour off?
What kind of spiritual force could smite a godly body with sores, bring fire from heaven, and turn staffs into serpents? And I submit that if God did not constantly protect His creation, and His chosen people especially, that the whole fabric of the world could be laid waste. So if people come into the church, and they seem suspiciously like Saul when he was tormented by an evil spirit, or like Nebuchadnezzar when he had lost his mind, or like the Gadarene demoniac, then I submit that the ministry of the Word might well be the best weapon and agent of healing, and not medications that deal with the fruit of the struggle.
And there are other causes. We suppress the truth in unrighteousness. We are all hounded by a smitten and wounded conscience. How much of the mental imbalance is due to guilt?
I'm just typing stream-of-thought. Maybe I should avoid that. I realize there isn't really a structure and flow to this post. My only point is, there are many causes of mental imbalance, and many times it would be wise to seek for the root of the problem.
How many Christian people suffering from extreme depression are watching filthy Hollywood productions on Saturday, going to church Sunday morning, and watching NFL football on the Sabbath? How many are making deep perusals in the word? How many are willing to combat this ennui and darkness with fasting. Christ even said, "This kind cometh not out but by fasting and prayer..." Surely there is a place for such.
At the end of the day, if it was between giving up on life, and taking medication, then I would completely and totally recommend medication. But before I did that, I would make sure that they were:
a) Getting a good dose of God's creation. There is something in the human soul that feeds on Beauty. Psalm 19 and Romans 1:20 come to mind. We need exposure to the heavens, we need the songs of birds, we need stiff breezes, we need exercise, we need to walk.
b) Dealing faithfully with sin, and seeking to be rid of it. If they were consistent Sabbath breakers, or continually gave in to pornography, or had some other area in which God might be dealing with them, then I would at least suggest that this might be a Fatherly chastening to goad them on to be vigilant in their war with sin.
c) Willing to at least put up a spiritual fight. I would want to at least spend some time in prayer, memorizing the word, singing Psalms in the morning to Elohim; would this person spend some extra time in prayer? Would they perhaps fast? Would the church fast or pray with them?
And if those means were diligently and faithfully applied, and their life was falling apart, then I wouldn't be opposed to medications. I just think that medications often mask the root cause of things, be in the noetic effects of sin, the effects of false doctrine, or demonic opposition.
And it is particularly keen to me, because there were times in my life when I probably could have been locked up, but God has been gracious in granting me a functioning psyche, and I realize that drugs, demonic lies, and the fierce assault of demons, who can send sensations and chills into your spirit and body, and who can plunge a mind into a world of lunacy... well, I know they are real. And I know that human pills wouldn't have done a thing for me. When you realize that you are a dark, miserable worm that is surrounded by malevolent beings of incredible power (which is the plight of natural man, c.f. Ephesians 2:1-3), then mental stress is the only natural result.
And I just have a passion for people to know that Christ is the Light of the World, that He is the Word that gave structure and form to the Kosmos at the beginning, that in Him all things hold together, that He is Wisdom, and that He can actually enter into your personal life, your own segment of reality, and "make true" the promises of the Scripture, and reproduce the Life-bringing, Spirit-pouring restorations of human beings that we see in Scripture.
The Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the devil.
That being said, I now realize, Rev. Barnhart, that this was a complete tangent. So as I've said before, I'm not necessarily against "drugs for the mind"
in principle, though I still have reservations. I also hope that I do
not have an inordinate passion for demons, and the existence thereof.
I have just seen a strong strain of practical disbelief in the reality and working of demonic entities in the real world. And I might very well be wrong, but I see that position as woefully and tragically incorrect.
Anyhow. I'm sure I did more to muddy the waters, when I had set out to clarify them.
Apparently that's how I roll.
Blessings!