The Cure for Pain

My sister got married today. My aunt and uncle came down for it. My aunt and uncle are independents registered as democrats who left the Catholic church but still remain generally Catholic in belief. My father, on the other hand, is an ex liberal turned conservative who was raised in the Catholic church and was excommunicated and is now Protestant. This leads to an open forum on subjects from political to moral to religious when my aunt and uncle visit.
This weekend was no exception. However, there seemed to be an awful lot of agreement on how bad of a job the government is doing in general, and how terrible this election is, and how 'winning the war' is an incredibly ambiguous and overall unrealistic goal. I agreed.

But, there was one thing my uncle said in jest--"one you get your PhD, I'll let you try to convert me." I said, "convert you to what?" And he said, "Whatever religion your going into. Presbyterian, Baptist..."
I told him that it's not about conversion or religion at all. (and this is really what I'm getting in my head these days...I had this conversation another time with my brother-in-law's cousin)

Whatever made us, whether you call it God or the Lord or Allah or the Great Spirit or whatever, whatever it was, when it created us, we, mankind, messed something up, and broke that relationship. Now, the only thing that matters is mankind and or Maker finding reconciliation through the person and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, and from there being reconciled to one another and helping one another also find this reconciliation with the Maker. It's not about turning people into Christians or baptizing them into our denomination or filling a seat in a pew. In fact, I think those things might only seem important because we've been raised with them for so long, when in reality, they're not as essential as we may think.

Jesus works in people in different ways--this doesn't mean that it's a different Jesus; Jesus is always the same. He just heals and challenges people in different ways, just as people have different personalities and different passions. Too often, we tell people that if something isn't happening in their lives (example: speaking in tongues, immediate freedom from addictions, etc) then Christ isn't at work. This is an absolute deception! Not to mention that it discredits the work Jesus truly IS doing in their lives.

My dad left and joked, 'have fun solving the world's problems.' And there's only one way to do that--and that is the Gospel, whatever that might mean to someone. Whether it means freedom from sexual sin, whether it means finally finding peace of mind despite absolute poverty, whether it means victory over suicidal thoughts, whether it means forgiving someone that has injured you, whether it means finding a loving spouse, whether it means fixing a broken marriage, whether it means being healed of a physical ailment. Whatever the Gospel is to someone, that is what we must allow it to be.

That is what we must preach--that the Kingdom of God has come, and it is moving, and that it makes no exceptions.