Better Living through Chemistry?

John Fischer's "Fischtank" piece today really strikes home. He writes of William Cowper, an 18th Century English poet who wrote some of the classic hymns that are still being sung today -- and how Cowper wrote them at times when he was in deep depression.

I can relate, and I'm sure a lot of us can: it's at the times of deepest depression that we have reason to contemplate God and His mercy and the meaning of Jesus' sacrifice on the Cross. Sometimes, I've felt strong enough to haul my own tail in front of the Cross: sometimes, my wife has been the one to point and push me there. But it does the job.

I can't help thinking that, if Cowper were living today, he'd have been put on heavy medication and, being so "normalized", would have continued on cruise control without even thinking he needed to contemplate God: thanks to Better Living Through Chemistry, he was "OK" and could get on with dealing with the things of the world, which are so much more important than contemplating God. And not only would Cowper have missed out, we -- more than 200 years later -- would be without what John Fischer calls Cowper's "legacy of depression".

Isn't that what happens with so many people today? Who needs Jesus when I've got my little bottle of pills to take twice a day before meals? Not only do they miss out on their own time with God, the rest of society misses out on their witness.