Ministry Weekend 2017 – IBCD

This session looks at Charles Spurgeon’s raw, honest descriptions of his depression and bodily pain. It also explores how consoling the sorrowful may mean looking to the Jesus of Gethsemane, where we see how He is with us and knows our pain.

We often jump to conclusions about other people’s sin. Strong-minded people are very apt to be hard on the weak and those depressed in spirit. Drawing from the Bible’s wisdom literature, this session urges us to resist simplistic thinking and trite answers, and learn how to enter into the pain of those who are hurting.

God often takes us through long trials rather than quickly bringing deliverance. This session looks at the Psalms, where we see biblical heroes like David at his lowest points and in deepest despair. We aren’t the first nor the last to feel this way and we can’t use Scripture superstitiously to wave away problems.

To care well for those who are depressed we need a theology of sadness itself. The Bible reminds us of the wisdom of meditating on grief and how it is wise to be sad about sad things and foolish to be shallowly mirthful. This session helps us all to learn how to weep with those who weep.

Drawing from the wisdom literature of the Bible, this session urges leaders to heed the call to be quick to listen and slow to speak. The fool thinks they know the answers before they know the questions. We can only truly begin to care for others after having first listened ourselves.

Leaders are not meant to be everywhere at once. Nor were they ever meant to fix it all. This session calls us acknowledge our own limitations and be attentive to how Christ enters into the midst of ongoing difficult circumstances.

In Ecclesiastes, we learn from Solomon about the errors that leaders are prone too. Too easily we forget we’re human and need rest just like everyone else. This session urges pastors to recover the virtue of rest and to be reminded of the Edenic rhythm that God intended for everyone.