Wounds

Why does the sinner sin? One who has never come to the saving grace and knowledge of Christ sins because they literally have to. They are bound with sin. The sin nature fully in place; this is the natural course of life. Birds fly, fish swim, sinners sin.

Why do Christians sin? A much deeper question, but with a similar answer. That which is unregenerated in man takes over, allowing the old man to rise.

But really, we need to look at the underlying causes for things.

Better questions, or more pertinent, could be "why does the addict use?" or "why does the drunkard drink?" or even "why does the glutton over eat?"

I'm afraid all lead to the same answer. We all want to be numb.

The idea my seem radical or even absurd, but it's true. We all carry some wound in life, or some care or some  burden. All of us, no one is exempt. Wounds can come in many forms: emotional, spiritual, psychological. Could be anything; financial troubles, self doubt, fear, worry for family. The list is endless. The path to sin is lined with the cares of temporal existence.

When we receive a physical would, we tend to it immediately. We cover it, hide it, try to keep it clean, try to heal it. If the pain is great enough, we take something to stop the pain. We want it healed or numbed immediately. 

True wounds, those to the soul, are a bit different. There is no easy balm or bandage for a broken heart. By broken heart, I don't necessarily mean that which comes from parting from a loved companion, though I don't altogether exclude it. Brokenheartedness refers back to the aforementioned wound (or burden) to the soul.

Still, we want our wounds mended immediately. We do not wish to endure one moment of anguish, or sadness, or loss, or brokenheartedness. None of us, sinner and saved alike.

So what do we do? We look for a spiritual Novocaine to numb us by reaching for the things of this life.

Be it booze or drugs or food or wealth or power or success or friends or possessions, we look for a panacea for our pain. As we dabble in these things, we may say we like the high we get. But really, the high means little. Not feeling low is the key. We want to be distracted, we want to not think, to not feel, to not deal with the reality of our situation. Again, sinner and saint alike.

Sadly, Christians often make themselves liars in times of distress. We preach, teach, and talk of strength and joy and peace from Jesus. When crisis hits, where are these things? Sure, we may pray. We may 'give it to the Lord'. But do we really do that?  And do we continue in prayer? Mostly, we say we give it up while holding ever more tightly because we know what giving it up means. We have to expend faith to believe, which, often, we were already in short supply of before the crisis. And what do we do when God doesn't answer in our expected time frame? Do we continue in prayer and faith? Mostly, no.  We reach for something of this world almost as readily as we reach for the pill bottle when a headache strikes.

We throw ourselves into work, into the social scenes, into our families, and sometimes we throw ourselves back into the same mirey pit Jesus saved us from.

No one likes pain. No one truly desires it. But as Christians we believe that God will not put more on us than we can bear. We must question then 'what purpose is this crisis or wound serving?' What is it working in me?

And not just in me, but what does God want others to see through this?

Sometimes God allows a wound to remain. He wants us to keep tending it, to keep coming before Him, to continually to Him.

Once a physical wound is healed, we pay that area no more attention.

This is also true spiritually.