new church life: march/april 2016
tell you that while pleasure and relief
may be what started them on their drug
of choice, not being able to handle the
process of stopping it is what kept them
addicted for so long. Once a person is
used to a drug, stopping it causes an
array of withdrawal symptoms that can
include nausea, body aches, diarrhea,
seizures, depression, fear and boredom
with everyday life. Facing any kind
of inner problem has a spiritual
equivalent of withdrawal.
We may even wonder if there will
be someone left if all these vices and
neuroses and membership cards to the
jerk club are wrested away from us.
Sometimes we may think to ourselves,
“This is what salvation looks like?
Shouldn’t it feel better? Should it really be this messy? Shouldn’t I be more
excited about this?” Because getting off the garbage pile is scary. Maybe the
worst part is having to face just how awful we’ve become, just how toxic we are
from eating all that garbage.
This is not an easy thing to face. In fact, we tend to avoid it at all costs,
armoring ourselves with logical excuses, self-righteous narcissistic rage, or a
good old pair of proverbial blinders. That’s why, for a lot of us, we have to
experience worse and worse consequences of our toxicity until we no longer
can ignore them.
Again using the addiction model, this is what is called hitting rock bottom.
The bottom of the pit, so low we can’t go anywhere lower. God loves rock
bottom. While we see it as the ultimate expression of our inner filth, God views
it as us finally loosening our grip on the filth we’ve been clinging to for dear
life. God loves rock bottom. In fact, He is orchestrating ways to get us there.
One of my favorite verses is in Hosea when God speaks of the wayward
Israel with these words: “I am now going to woo her; I will lead her into the
desert and speak tenderly to her.” Woo us into a desert? How many of us would
be eager to go on a date to a wasteland with a prospect of dying of starvation,
thirst, sunstroke or snake bite?
But what we see as the possible end, God sees as part of the love story
He has been writing since the beginning of creation. The best part of the love
story, in some ways, because it is where we finally become aware that we are
in the story. We might not like the desert. It’s hot and dry and prickly. But
What we see as the
possible end, God sees
as part of the love story
He has been writing
since the beginning of
creation. The best part
of the love story, in some
ways, because it is where
we finally become aware
that we are in the story.
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