When the Pressure Feels Too Great
Dear Friend,
Henry Goldzmit, best known by his pen name Janus Korczak, was born in 1878 in Warsaw Poland. He was a pediatrician and author of children’s books. In 1911 he opened a large Jewish orphanage called Dom Sierot. He loved children deeply and strived to take care of them in any way he could. When World War II began, life changed drastically for Janus and the orphans. In November 1940, the Nazis sealed the Warsaw Ghetto. Janus felt compelled to move his orphanage into the ghetto to help the children suffering inside. Conditions were horrific in the ghetto. Overcrowding, starvation, and disease threatened to crush the spirits of all the Jews inside, but in the midst of all this despair, Janus faithfully maintained the orphanage’s routines. The children were taught lessons, held concerts, and even theatrical plays within the worst conditions imaginable. Janus worked tirelessly to provide food, clothing, and medicine for the children.
In July 1942, the Nazis launched a large-scale deportation of the Warsaw Ghetto Jews to their death. Janus was offered escape, but he adamantly refused. On August 5th, 1942, German police gathered Janus, 192 children, and a dozen staff members and deported them to Treblinka. Janus calmed the children, promising them a picnic, and bravely went with them to their death. His life is a testimony of responding to great despair with hope and faith. Janus never gave in to the evil all around him, rather, he fought tirelessly for the weak and defenseless orphans.
Sometimes despair feels like a ton of bricks weighing on your shoulders. There are so many reasons why Christians might battle with despair and hopelessness. Like Janus, you might feel the crushing weight of wicked enemies who want to destroy your spirit. Maybe you despair of ever successfully fighting against your secret sins. Maybe you are suffering from injury, sickness, or the loss of a loved one. Most of the time, despair is the natural and right response to real wickedness and evil. Christians can faithfully respond to despair with hope and faith when they are deeply rooted in God’s love.
David was no stranger to despair. For much of his life, David was pursued by wicked men who wanted to kill him and his family. Almost half of the 150 psalms recorded in Scripture are songs of lament. While Psalm 18 is not a lament song, it offers a key tool Christians can use when suffering with hopelessness.
Psalm 18:1-6 says, “I love you, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies. The cords of death encompassed me; the torrents of destruction assailed me; the cords of Sheol entangled me; the snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called upon the LORD; TO my God I cried for help. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears” (Psalm 18:1-6 ESV).
When your heart is filled with despair, and you are ready to give up all hope, that’s exactly when you need to sing this song.
In the Bible, despair is described as the inner heart condition of hopelessness, in which a person believes that God is either unwilling or unable to deliver, forgive or restore them. Janus and the orphan children lived in desperate times, facing extreme wickedness and persecution, and yet he never lost hope in God’s ability to deliver them from the evil they faced. Just like Janus, David declares the Lord is his hiding place. These verses are a powerful reminder of who we should place our trust in.
When believers struggle with hopelessness, they can call upon the Lord like David. He turns to the only One who can save him from his desperate situation. The Lord is like a rock, solid, immovable, and eternal. There is no persecution, hardship, or trial that God cannot overcome. It’s easy to repeat these words and claim that we believe them. It’s easy to read this psalm and agree in our minds with the words. But it is when we are in despair, when we are at the end of ourselves, when we are confronted with our total inability to solve the problem when we experience the truth of this psalm.
God, in His perfect wisdom, power, and love, allows His children to go through hardships, trials, and loss. He does this because He knows that we cannot learn to cry out to Him and experience deliverance apart from the pain of sin and hardship in this world. Despair may be a natural and legitimate heart response to the trials you face, but the brokenness should lead you to greater faith in God.
I went through a difficult season of depression when I was 14 years old. My family had just moved from Chicago to St. Louis, and it felt as though my life had flipped upside down. All that was familiar was far away, and it felt as though a heavy cloud of hopelessness followed me all day long. I started to grow bitter toward my parents, and I began questioning the goodness of God. My mom confronted me in my sin, and pointed me to the Lord who is a refuge and a rock. I had to choose to decide who I would follow. I could wallow in pity and despair or cry out to the Lord for faith and strength. I know by experience that the Lord is a fortress, a deliverer, a rock, and a refuge for all who cry out to Him.
Have you ever heard the phrase, “God will never give you more than you can handle.” These words are often spoken by a friend or family member who truly wants to help you fight despair. The problem is that God WILL give you more than you can handle. His purpose is to drive you to Himself. Paul recalls a time when God gave him much more than he could handle in 2 Corinthians 1:8-10. He says, “For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again” (2 Corinthians 1:8-10 ESV). Paul and his friends had experienced the crushing weight of persecution and learned to rely on God.
The Greek word Paul uses for “burdened” literally means crushed, squeezed, heavily pressed down on. This word was often used for what people did to grapes when they made wine. These grapes were stomped, crushed, and squeezed of all their juices. Paul is saying that he and his friends were utterly squeezed of all their
juices. He despaired of life itself. Paul was confident that he was about to die, and he was faced with the reality of his hope.
God allows His children to experience seasons of depression to get to the utter brink of life and see who they really trust in. Despair becomes a helpful tool in God’s loving hands, to shape and fashion stronger faith in His children. When Christians view their despair in this way, they can respond to the trial the same way Paul and his friends do. Hope and faith spring up from the narrow well of despair.
God alone can deliver us from death. Death is the natural result of sin, and sin is the great problem each man, woman, and child must face. Because all people have sinned, all people must die. But God loves His elect so much, that He purchased their redemption by sending His Son to die on the cross. Jesus Christ didn’t just die for the sins of the elect; He was also raised to life by God’s great power. Jesus lives even now, interceding on behalf of His chosen people. When despair seems to crush your heart, overwhelm your mind, and threaten to undo you, place your hope in the One who raises the dead.
Hebrews 4:14-16 says, “Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:1416 ESV) Jesus knows your weakness intimately. He understands your despair, your pain, and your struggles. He knows them because He has been tempted in every way like you, but He did not sin. He can sympathize with you by experience, and you can place your hope solidly in Him.
When we despair of life, we are tempted to think that God is far away from our struggle. We can believe that God is unable or unwilling to deliver us from the trial. Often, we can feel unworthy of approaching the throne of God for help and deliverance. When we feel this way, we are right to say that we are unworthy to approach God’s throne in our own strength and righteousness. The author of
Hebrews is rooting our hope in Jesus, our great high priest. His perfect record allows Him to approach God on our behalf. His intercession is effective, and His blood covers us as we stand before the throne of God. Though our sin makes us weak, Christ’s righteousness gives us the confidence we need to cry out to God for help in our trials.
So, you see, it is the gospel of Jesus Christ that helps us battle our despair. It is faith in Christ’s work on the cross that drives us to cry out to God for help in our trials. It is the good news that in Jesus Christ we can confidently draw near to the throne of grace for mercy and help. Like Paul, the gospel causes us to rely on God rather than ourselves. Like David, the gospel encourages us to affirm and confirm the Lord as our rock and refuge. It is the good news of Christ’s perfect life, sufficient death, and glorious resurrection that offers the greatest tool to battle despair in our weak and timid hearts.
The phrase, “God will never give you more than you can handle,” is not true. God often does cause or allow His chosen people to go through more than they can handle. These trials feel overbearing, crushing, and hard on our weak shoulders. God reveals in His Word that He intends these trials to drive the elect to greater faith and hope in Him. God redeems the despair, the awful trials, and persecution by drawing us to Himself for deliverance. The phrase should be, “God can never give you more than He can handle.” This turns our eyes away from our own strength and points us to the One who delivers in our time of need.
I have a couple more things to say about despair. If your hope is in yourself, to deliver yourself from all the pain and problems you may face, you are in grave danger! You are a sinner in need of the grace of Jesus Christ. You cannot save yourself from your sin. Even if God in His incredible and unfathomable grace allows you to live a life free from problems, trials, and despair, you have every good reason to despair of life in heaven after death. Without hope in Jesus Christ, you will spend all eternity in torment, separated from the God whom you have despised.
To my fellow believer, my brother or sister in Christ, I want to assure you of your deliverance. Your deliverance from sin, persecution, trials and despair is as sure as Christ’s resurrection from the dead. Persevere in the struggle by crying out to the Lord for help and hope. He promises to walk alongside you in your struggle against despair. Use these passages to set your eyes on God and reach out to other believers for help. We were made to fight together against despair, and God has graciously equipped you with a family in Christ. I hope this message has encouraged you to fight against despair with hope and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Yours in Christ,
Chris A. Rice