The Spirit of Discouragement

“I am troubled; I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long…. I am feeble and severely broken; I groan because of the turmoil of my heart…. Lord, all my desire is before you; and my sighing is not hidden from you. My heart pants, my strength fails me; as for the light of my eyes, it also has gone from me…. But I, like a deaf man, do not hear; and I am like a mute who does not open his mouth. Thus I am like a man who does not hear, and in whose mouth is no response” (Psalm 38:6-14, NKJV).

As I read this psalm, I imagined David slumped in despair. Perhaps what troubled him most was that he couldn’t understand why he was suddenly cast down so low. This man hungered for the Lord, pouring out his heart daily in prayer. He revered God and wrote psalms extolling his glory. Now in his depressed state, all he could do was cry, “Lord, I’m at the end of my rope, and I have no idea why this is happening.”

Like many discouraged Christians, David tried to figure out why he felt so empty and broken in spirit. He probably relived every failure, sin, and foolish deed in his life and thought, “Oh, Lord, have all my reckless acts left me so wounded that I’m beyond hope?”

Finally, David reasoned that God must be chastening him. He cried, “O Lord, do not rebuke me in your wrath, nor chasten me in your hot displeasure!” (Psalm 38:1).

Let me point out that David isn’t writing just about his own condition in this psalm. He is describing something that all devoted lovers of Jesus face at some point in their lifetime: being under an attack from a plaguing spirit of discouragement, which comes straight from the bowels of hell. No Christian brings it on himself, nor does the Lord send it, and such an attack usually has nothing to do with any specific sin or failing by the believer.

Very simply, the spirit of discouragement is Satan’s most potent weapon against God’s elect. Most often, he uses it to try to convince us we’ve brought God’s wrath upon ourselves by not measuring up to his holy standards. With that in mind, the apostle Paul urges us not to fall prey to the devil’s snare, “Lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ignorant of his devices” (2 Corinthians 2:11).