All Christians

Back in May, I talked about my church’s decision to fight mental health stigma, in order to better serve our congregation and community. Since then, we have created a fully running mental health team which is looking to focus on three areas to move our church forward: educating people about mental illness to empower individuals who are struggling as well as encourage those who may be able to be a support, equipping staff, volunteers, and the congregation with training events and referrals to counseling for those who have more serious concerns that pastors cannot directly serve, and create community through the sermons and small groups.

This last point, we will talk about more at a later date. For today, though, we are going to talk about the training opportunities we have had and plan to continue to have.

As the year is wrapping up, we wanted to share some of our top posts of the year that pastors, counselors, and other Christians have been reading on the topics of Christianity and mental health. We are excited for what happened this year as we were able to reduce stigma about mental health, educate and train pastors, as well as find further direction in our mission. We look forward to what 2020 has to offer.

We’ve covered topics ranging from developmental disabilities, using faith practices as coping skills, educating counselors on mental health risks, addressing specific problems for youth ministry or marriages, as well as many resources and free videos for all Christians. For now, enjoy our top 10 posts of 2019.

We have previously talked about improving communication in your marriage and given several worksheets you and your spouse could go through to help develop empathy and conversations. This article is a fun version of that which bore out of a previous article on 10 Tips To Improve Your Marriage where point 8 says “Be Interested In Your Spouse.” So below are 25 marriage conversation starters to help reconnect with your relationship with your spouse.

We have a fun announcement for everyone that we’d love for you to come to see. I will be speaking at the Inclusion Fusion Live event on April 24, 2020. This will be a time for churches and families who have someone with a disability to come and hear about ways their family or ministry can help serve people with mental health, developmental disabilities, and the families and communities who support them.

We have talked about mental health during the holidays several times on this website, including what the holiday blues are, how addiction is impacted on mental health, and how loved ones can help those with mental illness during this season. But we wanted to identify in this article 9 ways Christians can manage mental health over the holidays to help you and your family during this winter season.

Created more than a decade ago, Hank Green, one part of the vlog brothers, created a channel called Crash Course as an experiment to use YouTube as a way to offer educational resources including everything from history, engineering, biology, and literature. In 2014, they decided to take on the topic of Pscyhology which dedicated a sizeable chunk towards the specific disorders within mental illness from the DSM.

Sometimes you come along another ministry or individual that is doing what you want to do eventually so well that you need to stop and point everyone else at what they are doing. Amanda Porter is one of those people who has really shown to have some amazing work and her latest project Dear Anxiety, Let’s Break Up shows just that.

One of the hardest connection points of talking about mental illness with people who may only have brief encounters is understanding the severity of it. Further, with Christians, we not only need to connect to the heartstrings of the individual but also how this impacts the story of God. Sparks of Redemptive Grace and it’s companion book 31 Days, 31 Ways 2 Pray 4 Families are written for this very reason.

We are currently going through a huge epidemic with substance use in America. I wrote an article recently for Key Ministry on updated statistics with regards to mental health and substance in America and one stat that was super concerning was that 89.8% of people with a substance use diagnosis (i.e. it is causing them mild to severe impairment in their life) is not engaged in any kind of treatment. That includes hospitalization, rehab, outpatient, ER services, self-help groups, or having a primary care physician.

The question is, are we looking at addiction wrong?

Recently, Barna released a study they have been doing on the millennial generation which they are calling The Connected Generation. To clarify, that is the title of the survey, but also what they are calling people who in 2019 are in the age range of 18-35. In the study, they found three important distinctions for this generation which they have tied to the faith perspective. Within this article, we will only be focusing on the first of how millennials are more anxious than previous generations.

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