All Christians

[This article is part of a youth ministry series we have been writing about for years. Click the link to check out all of the other articles we have here.]

Having worked in youth ministry for eight years of my life, I understand what it means when a youth pastor says “you never know what today will bring.” Sometimes this applies to the skills that are not formally on your job description like running sound, cleaning the bathrooms, or figuring out the right combination of baking soda for that one game which is probably a bad idea to play.

But we also know that teenagers are going through a lot of change in their lives. Having a book on hand for when you are forewarned about a crisis might be nice to have. Nobody expects a pastor to be an expert in crisis, but getting a quick three page crash course on a topic might be just what you need for a situation.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness is a grassroots organization that has spread across the United States in a response to a lack of education for families of those who have mental illness. It was seen regularly that clients with mental illness would be given coping skills, medication, and education on the disorders they struggle with, but the family would be seen as a secondary impact. Further the impact of the community for the individual and family also was not being fully addressed.

Since 1979, NAMI has been growing in it’s advocacy and education for communities around the United States, now with 500 local affiliates. The organization has numerous resources to share, but are best known for their educational groups for individuals and families called Family-To-Family and Peer-To-Peer.

For those who have struggled with mental illness or substance misuse, for well over six months, you may have felt the pain of helplessness and even hopelessness. Day in and day out without relief, the endless sorrow of losing a loved one, the oncoming panic attack, or the worry of another relapse can wear down the mind, heart, and soul.

But we also know that our hope as Christians does not come from within our own selves, but from God. He is near to those who call on Him.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
    and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

Psalm 34:18 (NIV)

If you are like me and my wife, you do not have it all together, so always learning, always growing, and always trying to be intentional is important. I say this knowing I’ve certainly had an argument with my wife today and I was in the wrong. Not “today” as in I wrote this, but every today that comes. So these 10 tips to improve your marriage are things I have been slowly trying to add over the last ten years of my marriage to my wife and I hope they help you.

If you are apart of our newsletter, you know we have been putting together a list of books we recommend you read behind-the-scenes as an easy resource for you to use. We think it is important to not only important to keep up-to-date on what others are doing with mental health within the Church, but also the discussion thought leaders are having on this topic. So we created a list of must reads on the topic of mental health and the Church. Today we are releasing our list of books we recommend you read to the public.

In the last couple of decades, a revolution is happening in the mental health field as we begin to integrate medical components into our program. It started with substance misuse treatment and quickly incorporated things such as an individual’s thyroid which can create anxiety and depressive symptoms or diet and exercise that can have significant positive impact with a person’s mood and relationships. One big integration that is still continuing to be explored, researched, and discussed is pain.

I have been on the hunt for a book that will help in creating a mental health ministry which helps to bridge the gap between the Church and professional counseling. Previously I’ve stated Amy Simpson’s Troubled Minds was the best book out there to make this connection (and at the heart of how a Christian family feels when someone struggles with mental illness, it still is the best). Then comes Steve Grcevich’s book “Mental Health and the Church,” which I will say has become the cornerstone for me in implementing a mental health inclusion ministry.

A few months ago, Jeremy featured an article on ChurchMag covering some Christian streamers, of which I was included. He recently followed up and asked me to write something about what makes me different from the other streamers in that article. You see, I’m on the autism spectrum. I have Asperger’s syndrome. I was diagnosed in middle school, which raised its own challenges, along with being a teenager. It’s those experiences, though, that shaped me into who I am today. In learning to deal with ridicule both at school and church, I’ve grown to know the Lord better and, through His grace, show His love to the world.

Your church has made a revelation and decided that your ministry can make an impact in your community by addressing the issues concerning mental illness in your community. You’ve decided to head up this cause and while putting the pieces together will take time, strategy, and money, you want to get started right away.

Below I’ll be sharing some free ways your church can stop mental health stigma today so that when you do get a budget item, you can already show progress. Certainly, there are cheap options like the Church Mental Health Awareness Cards or social media marketing, but we will look into that in a future article.

In today’s society, anger is one emotion that is regularly not expressed well. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy notes there are typically three responses to anger which can all be unhealthy: fight, flight, or freeze. Further, with our digital era and social media, impulse control mixed with anger tends to lead to erratic and harmful words expressed. In most of these responses, communication breaks down quickly, feelings are hurt, and relationships become hurt or broken.

Anger disrupts family get-togethers that we are not allowed to discuss political or religious topics. Parents yell at six-year-olds for not doing a good enough job on the soccer field. It’s become a such a problem culturally that it is seriously impacting the development of our children and how they act in society.

Childhood disruptive behaviors such as anger outbursts and aggression are among the most frequent reasons for outpatient mental health referrals.

“Behavioral Interventions for Anger, Irritability, and Aggression in Children and Adolescents.” Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology