- Welcome back to the Prayer Link.

Depression, grief, andanxiety are on the rise

in the face of a global pandemic.

A new survey by the CDCreports that 18 to 24-year-olds

have the highest levels of symptoms

of anxiety and depression,and a quarter of them

say they have seriouslyconsidered suicide.

Ben Courson personallyknows that struggle,

and he's opening up abouthis personal battles

in his new book, Flirting With Darkness,

Building Hope in the Face of Depression.

And he joins me now to share more.

Ben, welcome back to the show.

- Thank you so much for having me.

Every time I'm with you guys,

I leave just feeling so joyful.I love what you're doing.

- Well, we're doing it right then,

if that's the case, praise God.

Well, Ben, you were in a 10-yearstruggle with depression.

What was happening toyou during this time?

- Well, I felt that myfuture was swallowed

by an infinite gray.

You know, I'm literallylooking out the window

right now and I live in Oregon,

and we're just swallowed in smoke.

And you can't really seevery far ahead of you really.

That's what my future felt like.

All I could see was poisonousfog, billows of hell smoke.

I thought that tomorrow wouldbe no different than today.

And what scientific researchshows us is that the feelings

of self rejection and emotionalhurt are actually registered

and assimilatedneurologically in your brain

as physical pain.

So, I don't know ifyou've ever been through

so much physical pain that youjust wanted to die to end it?

That's what happened to me.

My brain was starting toregister my emotional hurt,

dealings of self rejection,as physical pain,

and I just wanted to end it all.

And that kind of led tomy over decade-long battle

with suicide ideation.

- Wow. So how, how bad did it get?

I mean, did you attempt suicide?

- I took up a knife tokill myself actually.

And fortunately somethingstopped me. God stayed my hand.

I rode my friend's streetbike as fast as I could

without a helmet or without a license,

didn't even know howto ride the full thing,

but I was flirting withdarkness and by that,

I mean I was flirtingwith suicide and death.

I went up to the tallestbuilding in my hometown

and was walking along the railing,

like a makeshift tight rope,and so I was constantly,

like, on edge and on theprecipice of suicide,

but I never actually attempted the deed.

I always was pulled back bysome force. I think it was God.

I really do that.- Absolutely.

- That kept me from that.

- Absolutely. Thank God you are here.

And you have written thebook, Flirting with Darkness

as part of your healing process.

Was there a one single point

where things startedto turn around for you?

- Yeah, God startedreally bringing desires

and dreams and visions to fruition.

One of the chapters Iwrite is called Dreamality.

I actually lay down 11 weapons to defeat

the dark lord of depression,

one of those being Dreamality.

You know, I think a lot of people think,

oh, that the heart is deceitfully wicked.

Who can know it?

So, I shouldn't listen to my heart.

But the Bible actuallysays, in the New Testament,

remember, Jeremiah says, ourheart is deceitfully wicked.

That's in the Old Testament,but in the New Testament,

God says, I've givenyou a regenerated heart,

a heart of flesh and not of stone.

So I write my law onthe table of your heart.

No man need teach hisneighbor, know the Lord,

for you shall all know the Lord,

from the least to the greatest.

So, God started showing me

that going away from myregenerated heart was about idea.

And instead, going moredeeply into my heart,

where He was writing His law,

as if on tablets, that started to heal me,

because the Bible says,may the Lord grant you

your heart's desire.

Psalm 20, Psalm 21:2 says,

the Lord has granted theKing his heart's desire.

Psalm 37:4 says, delightyourself in the Lord.

He'll give you the desires of your heart.

Psalm 145:19 says,He'll fulfill the desire

of those who fear Him.

Then again, the Psalms saythat He satisfies the desire

of every living thing.

Proverbs 10:24 says thedesire of the righteous

will be granted.

Again, Proverbs says, hopedeferred makes the heart sick.

But when the desire comes,it's as a tree of life.

So I found that as I enjoyed the joy

of being enjoyed by God,

which is the meaning of life,

that He started bringingdesires, visions, and dreams

to pass and turn myreality into a dreamality.

- I love it. I love it.

And Ben, you also write,

as you mentioned, about weapons to defeat

the dark lord of depression.

Walk us through some of those weapons.

- Yeah. One of them is prayer walks.

So, what neurologicalresearch has also showed us

is that when you talkintentionally to God,

the frontal lobe of your brain activates

into its highest intellectual capacity,

and you actually buildricher, thicker gray matter

in your prefrontal cortex,which is the part of your brain

responsible for creative thinking.

You also have greater activity

in your anterior cingulatecortex, where you find empathy

and compassion for other people.

You have less blood flow to your amygdala,

which is the rat brain where fear,

anger and stress are located.

So you can actually,through neuro-plasticity,

route and repetition,

change the very brain chemistry

of your cranial package by praying.

So, that was one of thethings that really healed me,

even before I knew the brain science,

was just going on prayer walks.

I didn't even know all this research.

Another one, real briefly, is endorphins.

You know, I get really practical.

A lot of times in the scripture,

the authors will talk about running.

They'll talk about boxing.They'll talk about shadow boxing.

They'll talk about the mastery.

They'll they'll talk about wrestling.

They use sports metaphors,especially Paul.

I think he was a sports fan,

'cause you had like thePanionium Games in Ephesus.

The Isthmian Games in Corinth.

The Olympic Games in Athens.

But basically, I found thatliterally putting my body

through physical exercise,

I do training with a Navy Seal,

and that's huge to get thecobwebs out of my mind.

What happens is when you exercise,

you release endorphins in your body,

which activate opioidreceptors in your brain,

which are similar to the drug morphine.

They're just a natural painkiller,

which is why science has also showed us

that if you go on a 40 minute jog,

it has the same effect on yourbrain as an antidepressant.

So, those are just a coupleout of the 11 weapons

I use to arm you to the teeth

to defeat the dark lord ofdepression in this book.

- Amen. And real quickly, Ben.

You know, everyone,everybody, me, everybody

is going to have a bad day.

How can we prevent onebad moment or bad day

from causing us to spiralinto a deep depression?

- We have to remember thatwe are forged by adversity,

that when we can gothrough fiery tribulation,

that fire does not burn us.

That fire forges us.

I'm a big believer insoul making theology.

And that is that whenwe go through suffering,

it actually fortifies our soul into iron.

If we won't react in cowardice,but respond with courage,

I believe that our messesturn into messages,

that our tests turn into testimonies,

that our heartbreak makes us wiser,

our tears make us braver,

and one day we're gonna thank our past

for a better future.

So we have no reasonto give up or give in.

We should give everything, butup, and put our hope in God.

- What an awesome message.

And we praise God foryou, pastor Ben Courson.

We appreciate you and what you're doing

to help others to overcomethis depression at this time.

Thank you so much.

And you can read about the other ways

to defeat the depression in Ben's book.

It's called Flirting With Darkness,

and it's available nationwide.