"Mental illness is just spiritual warfare I need to fight harder against."
How it sounds in your head: You've been told your depression is a demon you need to bind, that your anxiety is a spirit of fear you need to rebuke. So you're white-knuckling spiritual warfare prayers, commanding and decreeing, but the symptoms remain. You must not be fighting hard enough, binding correctly, or maybe you've given the enemy a 'foothold' somewhere you can't identify. It's exhausting, and you're losing.
"I returned and saw under the sun that—the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to men of understanding, nor favor to men of skill; but time and chance happen to them all."
-- Ecclesiastes 9:11Hyper-charismatic teaching conflated mental illness with demonic oppression, making every symptom a battle to win instead of a condition to treat, putting the burden of 'victory' on your spiritual warfare skills.
The language around mental health in some circles is exclusively spiritual warfare terminology, making you feel like therapy or medication would be 'giving up the fight.' Your ongoing symptoms feel like lost battles proving you're a weak warrior.
Epaphroditus was 'sick almost unto death,' and Paul didn't rebuke demons or tell him to fight harder—he acknowledged the SICKNESS and God's MERCY in his recovery. Physical/mental illness, not spiritual warfare in this case.
I REFUSE the lie that all mental illness is demonic warfare I need to out-fight. IT IS WRITTEN that time and chance happen to all, and not every struggle is a demon to bind. Some things are BIOLOGY needing treatment, CHEMISTRY needing balance, TRAUMA needing therapy. IT IS WRITTEN that Jesus had COMPASSION on the sick and healed them—not everything was a deliverance. I will seek DISCERNMENT, not just declarations. I am not a weak warrior for needing medication or therapy; I am a WISE steward of the brain God gave me. I am BARAK-BLESSED, and that covenant doesn't require me to fight biology with binding prayers alone. My Father has provided DOCTORS, THERAPISTS, and MEDICATION as tools, and I will use them without shame. Spiritual warfare is real, but so is neuroscience, and I will honor BOTH.
Your Father isn't watching you exhaust yourself in spiritual warfare while withholding the medical help you need. He's the One who invented brain chemistry, and He's already provided the doctor, therapist, and prescription as part of His care for you.