Christian rehab

"...I remember two things -- that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Savior." -- John Newton

I have mentioned in previous posts that as I have gotten older (and owned a DVR) that I find myself watching less and less television. It holds little interest to me and that is not necessarily a bad thing. I think when I was younger it provided me with a mindless outlet so I could avoid confronting myself, and the escapism was a welcome retreat. Now it serves more as a window with a view; a view that shows the brokenness of the world and the steady decline of the human existence. Kind of a depressing sentiment for a Friday morning, but stick with me because while this might be a brutally honest statement I am stubbornly optimistic. Something our Pastor reminded us that we need to be when preaching on Matthew 5:4 from the Sermon on the Mount; “"Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

I do like some, but not all of the reality television shows; just probably not the ones that are on most people’s top 10 viewing list. I am a fan of shows like “The Deadliest Catch”, “Chopped” and “American Pickers”. The rest of the dancing, singing, child rearing and dating reality shows are not for me. One show that fascinates me is called “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew” and it chronicles the life in a drug and alcohol detox facility for “celebrities” which is a very loose term. The participants are former sports stars, aging models, actors and pseudo-celebs from reality shows. These are people who seemingly have everything going for them including money, fame and notoriety yet they have thrown it all away in drugs or the bottle. You see them at their lowest possible condition and sadly it is like a train wreck you cannot turn away from.

What is it that draws me to this show? Maybe it is a sobering (no pun intended) reminder of the result of bad choices and their results we all are prone to make or the depth we can all sink to trying to find our identify, satisfaction and hope in anything and everything other than a personal relationship with God through His Son Jesus Christ. Or maybe it is because while these stories break my heart and bring a tear to my eye because of the brokenness, I am stubbornly optimistic that there is hope for these individuals because in my heart I know that God is a God of second chances. I watch because I want to root for these people to straighten out their lives, and I want to see them change for the better. But in the back of my mind I know that any lasting change and true renewal can only come if they accept the free gift of grace through the atoning work of Jesus Christ on the cross.

During his sermon my Pastor reminded us that we “Christians are called to be brutally honest about pain and sin in the world, but we also need to be stubbornly optimistic about our hope in Christ and what God is going to do.” But do we need to attend a little rehab or detox ourselves? Have we become addicted to our own “righteous” condition that we fail to echo the words of the Apostle Paul; “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost”? Like these celebrities we have everything in Christ yet we rely on or depend on our own wisdom, power and reason rather than what has been provided to us through the Gospel. We grow complacent in our own “spirituality” and fail to make progress in our relationship with Jesus Christ.

There is a song called “Deeper Still” and the lyrics serve as a reminder to me that I am still a work in progress. “Take me through the wonders of Your faithfulness; Help me see the depth of my own need; Lead me to the water where Your mercy is; For You and You alone can set me free. I am covered by Your grace; Far away from shore; As You’re taking me to places; I have never been before. Take me deep enough where I can see the bottom of Your heart; Deep enough that I can know Your will; Take me deep enough to know that we will never be apart; And when I get there; Take me deeper still.” Do we see the depth of our own need and does this broken world remind us that we are just sinners saved by Grace? Do we preach the Gospel to ourselves everyday and remind ourselves that in the depth of our heart a sin nature still resides and subtly tries to make us think that we are in far better shape than we really are? We are like the Laodiceans in Revelation 3; in need of nothing, or so we think.

One of the cautions the Pastor gave in his sermon is that if we are only brutally honesty we risk becoming cynical. Our cynicism in essence questions the sovereignty of God and we only recognize the problems of the world and have no hope that others can change. We take the attitude that the world is broken so why try? He also reminded us that we cannot be naïve about the condition of the world and focus only on the hope to come. If we have a romantic view and look past or are insensitive to the world around us and fail to identify with it, we will become callous and uncaring. We each need to remind ourselves that the Cross turned our pain to joy and that our mourning turned to hope when we look to the finished work of Christ. We need to not only see the need of the world but the depth of our own need on a daily basis for God’s mercy and grace. Maybe the reality show we need to watch is in our own heart; “Christian Rehab with Dr. Jesus the Great Physician.”

"For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” ~ John 3:17