A recent survey by American Psychiatry says that nearly half of American households have had someone seek mental health treatment this year! This is just one such survey revealing the struggle and confusion of the human soul. Believing in God but not trusting Him practically is like the above picture.

Another study done in 2007 found that 3 out of 100 people struggle with depression. The same study showed that people being treated for depression tripled in the early 1990s. Overall about 8.7 million people were treated for depression in 2007 compared to 6.5 million in 1997. Today it is estimated that 11% of people world-wide suffer from some form of depression and among adolescents under 18 years of age its closer to 70%. Is it any wonder the suicide rate is up so high with teenagers?

One of the few things children are not taught is how to be humble enough to ask for help regularly. If you were encouraged to ask, you were a fortunate child. As adults, we assume kids will figure out they need others in their lives to learn and navigate this life. Too often, kids experience criticism in their quest to learn and end up being afraid of showing any kind of weakness with regards to their intelligence or skills.

All to often, when kids become adults, they carry this baggage of insecurity in their souls, which cheats them of a rich life with others. With all the electronic devices we use, we have become so unaccustomed to asking for help from another human being, and instead, refer to the internet to solve our ignorance or lack of inexperience. Now the internet is a great tool, like all the YouTube tutorials, but t’s so sad that we are becoming more insecure rather than well-balanced as human beings because of using it. Texting, emails and the like are convenient, but have a cost of isolation and further awkwardness in interacting with others.

Life has a way of feeling like a “Tug-Of-War” and, so often, we never seem to reconcile why. Without getting too complicated, let’s unravel the elements that make up the individual and why we tend to be pulled in more than one direction. Put your seatbelt on and hang in there with me and be prepared to have your brain stretched just a little bit…it will be worthwhile in the end!

I have desired to investigate the concept of the “Soul” and how the health or sickness of the soul affects our everyday life, so in this article I wanted to address the seeming tug-of-war between our soul and spirit. From my studies over the years, the soul and spirit are inseparably linked, although one may be the proximate leader.

As we have discussed previously, our spirit is given to us by God when we come into existence and our soul is a combination of our mind, will and emotions. To make matters more complicated, we have a personality that is part of our soul, which is also given at birth, that is both a composition of what God gives us and what our genetic heritage gives us. Still with me?

Ever wonder why your Christian walk seems to be erratic? Why you just can’t seem to have a stable Christian walk with God and people?

This is a complex question, but one worth investigating. Just because the question is hard doesn’t mean we should avoid it. The soul itself is often a mysterious topic, and most writers in the last 50-75 years don’t refer to the soul much at all if ever. If you go back 100 years or more there was a lot of discussion about the soul and it’s importance. Writers in the past spent their whole life trying to understand the soul and it’s function.

Today, if a writer or commentary refers to the soul they say it’s not important, only a person spirit is what’s important because they say our soul will be lost when we die and only our spirit survives. First, this is totally false as the soul and the spirit are often the same word in Hebrew as well as greek being “breath” or air. Now I am no scholar, but there is a enough passages of scripture to see that the soul and the spirit often are inseparably link to each person. Secondly, they assume the soul fades when a person dies. King David wrote about the soul a lot.

The first Jaws movie came out in 1975. I was traveling to Nashville Tennessee that year and my friend persuaded me to go to the theater to watch it. I could not go swimming in the ocean for months after that because I would hear that music in my head.

Isn’t is amazing what movies can do in shaping our thinking and living?

Billy Graham’s body is being laid to rest here in Charlotte, North Carolina today.

Few ministers have impressed me like Billy Graham. Though he was a man who was not perfect, he reflected a key value which I wish many other ministers did: Humility!

Sometimes thinking about the future can be confusing at the least and overwhelming at best, but it doesn’t have to be that way. You can choose.

We all choose the paths we walk on, whether we realize it or not. We may choose to walk with a certain crowd of people and therefore we are on a path based on the groups preferences, yet it now becomes our path because of our association.

We may choose a path because it promises joy and happiness. Someone convinced us this path is the best. Let me tell you, unless it’s God ordained, the end will not be what we thought.

We may choose the path in life because our culture or family are on it. Sometimes it’s just easier to go with what’s familiar rather than thinking through things on our own, but what if they all are on the wrong path? Culture and family, unless God ordained, is headed the wrong way no matter if it’s familiar or not.