Today’s post is sponsored by BJU Seminary and written by Brian Hand, professor of New Testament interpretation. BJU Seminary equips Christian leaders through an educational and ministry experience that is biblically shaped, theologically rich, historically significant, and evangelistically robust.
Melancholia—on a spectrum from simple sadness to profound discouragement, then crossing a moral line into despair—marks nearly every life at some point. Sorrow even appears throughout Scripture, and the biblical evidence seems to run the gamut of mild sorrow (the rich young rule in Matthew 22, whose sorrow was induced by personal sin) through severe despondency (Job and David among others, whose sorrow was induced by circumstance, sickness, or Satan) to depression with despair (Judas), and it does so without ever using modern, scientific designations.
A biblical-theological examination of melancholy should help us nuance our understanding of human sadness, and it shows us that melancholy is an emotional reflection of a fallen world. Upon such examination, which is detailed in my article in BJU Seminary’s Journal of Biblical Theology & Worldview, I find three avenues of application useful for sufferers and counselors alike.
First, the Church should strive to exercise great tenderness in handling cases of melancholy, understanding that distress
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