Only God who made us can change our hearts and transform us from within. When considering depression, we must understand that the problem is too deep, too ingrained in us, too much a part of who we are for us to expect to find a cure with man. Only God has the solution, only He can fix our problems in a thorough, deep and lasting way. And that’s exactly what God does, it’s exactly what has happened to me, and I know He can do the same thing for you. This course is about looking to Him to accomplish it.
In the previous lesson, we began looking at Isaiah 61:1-3 which describes the work that Jesus would do (His ministry to us) and we found some things directly related to depression. Let’s review that passage again, and then we will look at it in some more depth:
Isaiah 61:1-3 NIV The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, (2) to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, (3) and provide for those who grieve in Zion— to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendor.
In lesson 2, we quickly considered these things that Jesus came to do. But for the next several days of this course, I want us to look at how Jesus Christ actually accomplishes these things as we examine this passage in some depth. This is where the gospel comes in, the good news that transforms us when we believe it. Here is the truth that we will look at today.
“He sent me to bind up the brokenhearted.”
Jesus came to minister to our hearts, to heal and mend them, to bind them up and make them whole. This is possibly the best news anyone could ever hear because it means that Jesus Christ changes us at the core of who we are, fixing our problems at the deepest level of human existence. But, you might ask, how does He do this?
There is a specific way in which Jesus mends our broken hearts, and it is through His death on the cross in our place.
But why did Jesus have to die on the cross in our place? And what does His death have to do with our depression?
Let’s take these questions one at a time. First, why did Jesus have to die on the cross in our place? Our God is a holy and perfect God; He requires absolute perfection from His people in order for us to be accepted. God gave the nation of Israel His Law, the 10 Commandments (found in Exodus 20), and that law required perfection.
But we are unable to keep the Law (Romans 8:1-2), we fall short all the time and cannot live perfectly (Romans 3:23), so God made a plan to deal with our failures. In love, God sent His Son to this earth to live perfectly in our place (Romans 8:3). Jesus came and kept the Law of God perfectly for us, and now all Jesus’ perfect living, all His holiness and righteousness, is credited to the account of each and every person who believes.
And yet God not only required righteous living, He also required payment for sins committed. “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Again we are unable to pay this enormous sin debt; but God, who knows all things and knew this in advance, had planned for our poverty. God loved us so much that He sent Jesus His Son, not only to live righteously in our place but to die as our Substitute (John 3:16). God took all your sins, everything you’ve ever done or thought wrongly, everything you should have done but didn’t do, off of you and put them on Jesus.
Jesus paid for your sin by His own death (Romans 6:23), and having completed this transaction on the cross He cried out “It is finished!” (John 19:30). This same phrase, “it is finished” was found, in the first century after Christ’s death, written on a tax receipt, and was translated, “Paid in full!”
Question 2. Do you believe the gospel message, that Jesus died in your place and paid your sin debt in full? Why or why not? Please share:
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Tori writes, "100% completely. It is the only way to lasting victory to believe this. It is everything life is about, God's sacrifice and resurrection of Christ. The redemption story is the most important story of all, and I can only Thank God that he has given me the blessing of truth to truly believe this."
Raph writes, "I do believe he died for my sin on that horrible cross, so I could live..The depression follows me , although unconsciously, from the very childhood .... I am so tired and burdened, I need to be able to leave all this at His feet.."
Rob writes, “Oh yes, with all my heart. The darkness of my existence reflected the blackness of my heart of sin. Yet when I finally, in utter desperation, accepted this truth that he paid the debt in full, a brand new light, and a dawning sense of 'lightness' broke through at last.”