Balm For The Battered Soul

When you are wrestling with “soul-trouble,” Charles Spurgeon, who battled deeply with depression, offers the following wise advice:

• Should the power of depression be more than ordinary, think not that all is over with your usefulness.
• Even if the enemy’s foot be on your neck, expect to rise and overthrow him.
• Cast the burden of the present, along with the sin of the past and the fear of the future, upon the Lord, who forsakes not his saints.
• Put no trust in frames and feelings.
• Care more for a grain of faith than a ton of excitement
• Be not surprised when friends fail you: it is a failing world.
• Be content to be nothing, for that is what you are.
• Set small store by present rewards; be grateful for earnests by the way, but look for the recompensing joy hereafter.
• Any simpleton can follow the narrow path in the light: faith’s rare wisdom enables us to march on in the dark with infallible accuracy, since she places her hand in that of her Great Guide. 

From Lectures To My Students.