Jesus, the Universal Panacea?

One thing I've noticed is that many Christians seem to see Jesus as a magical "cure-all". If you only believe, all your illnesses will be healed...

Well, most don't actually say that (all the bad press given to the Christian Scientists mean they don't) but that is the trend of their thought. Now, if you have cancer, or some other physical disease, people will pray for you (no problem with that) and most will not say "don't take your medicine" or anything. But with mental illness the situation is different. Why is it that Christians don't believe it exists? That it is either a temptation from Satan or a sign of sin?

Personally, I have suffered from chronic depression many times. I also am on the lesser end of the bipolar scale, am obsessive & self-injure. I have been told many, many times that this is evidence of unrepented sin. I have thought and thought and I honestly cannot find that evidence. However, when I am at my worst, depression-wise, that thought that this is God's punishment does a very nice job of pushing me further into it.

Now, an example of this approach comes from behindthebadge.net, a Christian police officer's apologetics site. He says:

"I want to talk to you about suicide and cutting, but I must tell you right up front that those are not diseases they are symptoms of the disease. Do you have a empty feeling and a feeling of despair? Those are normal, everyone has them. Many people try to fill those empty places in their lives with drugs, sex, alcohol, suicide, you name it. Some of the things even seem to help for a short time, but the emptiness will always come back. Believe me; been there, done that... It took me a long time to realize what was missing in my life; Jesus Christ. He loves you and me and wants to have a relationship with us, but we stand in the way of that by the things we do."

This is exactly the "Jesus as panacea" approach. Mental illness is seen as a natural result of not being Christian. I've seen it said that those non-Christians who are psychologically healthy are the hard-hearted ones who cannot be won to Christ. The trouble is that that looks to me like a very suspicious form of evangelism - go for those who are ill and therefore vulnerable, as they're easier to convert. I'm sure the majority of Christians do not consciously think that, but it does seem to be the unconscious motive behind this. If you are of a religious turn of mind, or curious, depression is likely to make you question faith, what you believe, if you should believe. Its true that we all ask God for help when we most need it then neglect to keep up our end of the deal once we're better. But that means Christians should be so careful about how they treat the mentally ill who come to them. The fact is that it is an illness. Now yes, if you committed some horrible crime its fairly likely that you might get depressed as a consequence. But for people like me, its just a chemical imbalance. Being told that its a sign of sin is only likely to make it worse. Particularly if you are encouraged to give up medication in order to resolve your sin-issues better.

I don't like the idea of Jesus as some hyper-medication, useful for curing anything wrong with you. Frankly this strikes me as being disrespectful. There is more to faith than what you can get out of it. Deciding "oh I'll believe, because then I'll get better" is a very mercenary approach. And its not one I'm comfortable with.

Besides which, what sort of damage does this do to Christians? They get ill like everyone else. If you are Christian and mentally ill, what sort of excess of self-hate will that bring on? I see lots of examples of depression in the Bible - half the Psalms and certainly Ecclesiastes seems to be written from a depressed state of mind. And Jesus got depressed. Some of it is perfectly natural, and not a consequence of sin or punishment, some is simply illness, that should be treated rather than condemned.

Why not see Jesus as a lover who will be with you during depression rather than as leaving you when things get tough because you sinned? Or because he's decided to punish you?

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