The Divine Crash

For the last five years I have taken massive amounts of medication for chronic headache.  Not migraines but headaches that have no known cause and no known cure.  They seem to strike men between 23-35 and sometimes they go away on their own and sometimes they don’t.  For me, they went away and it makes me think of how people do evangelism. The only treatment is to try different medications and different combinations until we can treat the pain. As a result, I have taken medications that have made me forget things, like where I parked my car.  I also took medications that made me angry or hallucinate.  Once, I had a medication that made me so angry I was screaming at my wife for not shutting the basement door all the way.  I was so angry with her I couldn’t see straight.  I never took that medication again and refused to take it ever again.

However, praise Jesus, as of today I am off my meds.  I will still need to carry an emergency headache pill with me all the time but no more daily medications and I will only have to see my neurologist (who has been wonderful) once per year.

This to me is very similar to the way it works to share the gospel with people.  Some people have different reactions to different attempts to talk about Jesus.  Some are revolted by a political Jesus while others respond very well to a Jesus who is a political figure.  Some react violently over a Jesus that is a liberator, yet some people desperately need to hear that Jesus liberates people from the slavery and oppression their sin brings them.

Maybe this is why Jesus can be so many things to so many people and still be the savior of the whole world.  No one way of portraying Jesus will save everyone but portraying Jesus in a way that matters will change everyone.

It took 4 years to get the right combination of medications to stop my daily headache.  Sometimes it takes years of walking with a person and talking to them to figure out how to present Jesus to them in a way that matters and will make sense to them.

This is why missionaries to India dress up as Hindu Holy Men so that people will ask them questions and they can share the real truth.  This is why pastors in the city where baggy jeans and a backwards hat so that people will know they are all equal.

So then, for those of you in pain and desperately needing something to fix the ache you feel, Jesus is the ultimate healer but sometimes you need medications.  There is no shame in that.

So then, are you trying to find a way to share Jesus with your neighbor in a way that makes sense?  Keep trying, spend time with your neighbor, get to know them and figure it out.  You can do it, it may take years but when you do and you see their pain leave their body and refreshment come in then it will all be worth it.

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Church Thoughts by RevBT