Thursday, September 02, 2010

The Manic-Depressive Personality

Joshua 7:11 KJV
Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed my covenant which I commanded them: for they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen, and dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff.

The root lesson of this verse is that Israel, and for that matter the people of God, are a unity. We rise and fall together.
• As a church and
• As families.
One in the body impacts the body as a whole.

The context is a demonstration of what modern day man would call the manic-depressive. The world has labeled, (and too often Christians have bought into it) as a disease, what is nothing more than sin left alone.

First Israel was ecstatic, confident and high.
They had won a huge victory at Jericho and they felt very good about it.

But when they lost at Ai
They immediately ended in the depths of depression.

They then fall on their face before God
But He refused to let them stay there. This was a matter of sin. Deal with the sin and the despair will disappear.

What is the cure for the manic depressive?

First, seek God.
Although Israel was in the place God gave them, they did not seek God in Ai. Too many claim to be saved and attend church but they do not get their directions for life from God.

Second search out the sins in life.
Do not expect that because you do not realize it is a sin in your life that you can get away with it until God convicts you. Set your life along side the holiness of God and dig out what is sin. Discover it. Ask God to reveal it.

Third, have no mercy on the sin.
It is the cause of the manic depressive personality.
• It must be mortified.
• It must be dealt with.
• It must be stoned, burned and buried.

Fourth, get up.
Do not lay down defeated. Having dealt with the sin, seek God's direction and move forward once again.

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