Music: A Tool in the Toolbox

Welcome to Brevis Talk. The talks you are about to hear will be honest, revealing, and unfiltered. Join us as your host, pastor Wayne Whiteside lifts the lid of silence and has conversations about mental illness and health in the church. The goal here is simple. It is to help someone along this journey of life who is struggling. It is to tell the truth to the unsuspecting, and it is to lighten the load of a fellow traveler. This podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to serve as medical advice or to replace consultation with your physician or mental health professional.

If you are experiencing a medical crisis, call 9 1 1 or go to the nearest Emergency Room. Now, here's your host, pastor Wayne.

Speaker 2 (43s): Welcome to another brevis talk, as we will add today, yet another tool in the toolbox as we talk about fighting mental illness. I can't stress how important it is that you cannot be passive. You must engage, you must be active. I do understand the motivational problems when a person is depressed. You don't want to do things, but you've got to press yourself and you've got to have a team.

I would say, and we'll talk more about that in the coming days, you need a team, a, an accountability team that's going to help you and keep you moving and keep you to stay connected, and you absolutely need a team. Well, today, our tool that we add to the toolbox is music. So many studies out about music, how powerful it is, how therapeutic it is.

There's a nonprofit organization in Canada that refurbishes iPods for persons patients who have dementia, and they'll go back with a history with the family and find out what the music this person grew up with and enjoyed. And they will load those iPods with the music of their youth. And it's been phenomenal. As they listened to this music, many that were totally inactive, sitting in chairs, and they sort of awakened, if you will, and began to be active and sometimes sing along with those songs.

It's pretty incredible stuff, and God bless that group and I wish them much, much success. We're told that music gives the brain a workout and the various types of music. I will not get involved in that today. I have my preferences. You have your preferences, but I will say this concerning music being A Tool in the Toolbox, don't underestimate and don't throw away.

At least consider classical music. You have all the various instruments and, and all the, the timing that go into that with the symphony, and it gives the brain an incredible workout. There are two, two areas of music. There's passive where you were listening, and the therapy is there. It's the, the studies are there over and over. You can go to Pub Med, P-U-B-M-E-D, and that is a government site concerning studies about medications, about various things.

And you can put a search in there about music and the mind music and depression and it'll, it'll pop up study after study, but there is passive music, if you will, that's listening And. then there is active where you actually are doing some singing, and both of those are very good and very, very much needed. I hope you are a musically oriented person. I know some people are more so some listen to music all the time, some on less, more rare occasions, but I hope you will consider that.

I wanna tell you a story that I find interesting. I'm intrigued by this. Always have been. In First Samuel chapter 16 of the Old Testament, we're told that King Sa had a harmful spirit that tormented him. The English standard version says, harmful spirit, a wicked spirit, a tormenting spirit, various translations, but this evil spirit tormented Saul.

And so they ask around about music. Is there someone who can play music for the king? And in chapter 16, that first Samuel 16, verse 23, it tells us that they sought David and who would be king later And. it says that whenever the harmful spirit was upon Saul, David took the liar, LYRE and played it.

Saul was refreshed and was well, and the harmful spirit departed from him. I'm reminded that the scripture says elsewhere that God has given us a garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness or the spirit of depression and music. Again. It's incredibly powerful. I hope that you'll utilize it, take it out of the toolbox and use it as a, a means to attack your depression or your mental illness, your anxiety, whatever it is that, that you're fighting with.

And I think you'll find, if you'll, if you'll take the music test, the music challenge, whatever you wanna call it for me, find out what it is that music and, and, and something peaceful You know, I'm not talking about stuff that's you're beating off the walls. There's not nothing peaceful about that. You may like that type of music, but I'm talking about music that speaks to your soul and speaks to your heart, and speaks to your spirit and has a calming effect upon you.

Music is an incredibly powerful thing. The people of have been called by God to sing to and will be singing for all time and eternity, and they are called to be a part of a choir, a heavenly choir one day. And so music is very, very powerful and I hope you'll consider that. God bless you,

Speaker 0 (7m 13s): And. that concludes our broadcast today. Please don't forget to subscribe to the podcast through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Plus, check us out at our Facebook page or brevistalk.com and take a look at our blog and remember, be kind. Always be kind.