depression

9/29/10 I was driving back from a meeting in San Antonio, listening to NPR, about 4 p.m. yesterday when I heard the news. A young man, only 19 years old, a math major at the University of Texas, had taken an assault rifle, an AK-47, onto the campus where he fired a few rounds before going into the library where he took his own life. How tragic! We try to understand. We try to fill in the blanks. Why does someone do something like this? For the person, their suicide seems to answer all their questions. For the rest of us, we only have more questions.

Unfortunately over my 32 plus years of ministry, I have been the pastor who has officiated the funerals of those who have taken their own lives. I don't pretend to understand depression. At these funerals, I say if Christ came for the most vulnerable, then He certainly came for those who dwell in such deep sadness. If Christ came for the least, the last, and the lost, then He certainly came for one who suffers from depression.

Love,
Lynn