Tell My Junk? No Way!

I’m teaching a class this quarter for Miami International Seminary on counseling addicts. Last night I went over the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous with the class. The reaction that many had to the fourth and fifth steps was interesting.

Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

Step Five: Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

“That’s terrifying!” “I’m emotionally exhausted just thinking about it.” “No way would I ever do that!” “Why would anyone want to do that?”

I’ve often heard addicts say similar things. Many resist taking those steps. Some take quite a bit of convincing to get them to see value of getting all their “junk” out. But then addicts, usually, have been hiding and lying and deceiving for years. They don’t have much practice in being honest about themselves or even with themselves.

One of the reasons that many have continued to drink or use was so they wouldn’t have to face their junk. Which is precisely the point why they need to get it all out.

James wrote that we should confess our sins to one another (James 5:16). He understood the when leave hiding and live in the light that we can thrive. Doing so can set you free from a lot of baggage.

I expected people with years of experience in church and learning the Bible would understand the value of dealing with their stuff. But their reaction was no different from what I’ve typically heard from addicts. So I guess we’re not so different after all.

Hope When Life Is Hard

Life is rarely easy for very long. Trials and difficulties unrelentingly challenge our faith and peace. Some pick at us as minor annoyances, others come like a flood and overwhelm.

Often those trials come from external sources – illness invades our bodies, cars break down, jobs disappear, relationships become strained, friends turn on us. Unchecked, any of these can lead to hopelessness and despair.

But perhaps the more difficult and discouraging trials are those which come from within. Though we promise God to turn from our sin we commit the same sins all over again. We determine to be transformed yet remain the same. We resolve to be victorious but quickly fail. Brennan Manning described the experience well in his book The Ragamuffin Gospel.

"When I get honest, I admit that I am a bundle of paradoxes. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am trusting and suspicious. I am honest and still play games. "

What should we do when it becomes too much, when a broken world crashes down one more time, when we once again fall and fail? Many will feel like giving up. They may think, “I just can’t deal with it. I don’t want to deal with it. I’m just too tired. Quitting is so much easier.”

The Apostle Paul gave a much better answer in his first little to his friend and disciple Timothy. He told Timothy to remember that Christ Jesus is our hope. Jesus not only gives hope, he is our hope. Hope resides in his person and anyone who flees to Jesus will receive that hope as well.

The Frozen Chosen

FROZEN CHOZEN

I am a Presbyterian. I have been a Presbyterian for 39 years. Initially, I went to a Presbyterian church simply because that’s where my friends attended. As I studied Presbyterian doctrine, however, the teachings resonated with me and I crossed over from being Presbyterian by convenience to Presbyterian by conviction.

Others often think, with some justification, that we Presbyterians are too reserved in our worship. We don’t tend to be a very demonstrative people. We rarely clap while singing. Hardly ever will a Presbyterian encourage a preacher by shouting “Amen.” And, about the only time a Presbyterian will raise his hands in worship is if he’s instructed to do so. Combining our reserve with one of our doctrinal distinctives, election, or the belief that God chooses those who are saved, some people poke fun at us Presbyterians by calling us the frozen chosen.

Recently, I heard Dr. Richard Pratt, president of Third Millennium Ministries, present a different spin on the term frozen chosen that wasn’t very funny, but it was convicting.

Some of us, because we misunderstand election, start to believe there must be something special about us. Why else would God choose us? But that’s the exact opposite of what the doctrine really teaches. Election doesn’t teach that there is something special about us. Election says that there is something special about God.

Election teaches that God chose, at the cost of his own life, to rescue certain people, everyone one of whom was thoroughly corrupt, in rebellion against his rightful rule and in whom nothing good could be found (Romans 3:10-18). There is nothing special about these corrupt rebels. Who is special is God, who has been gracious and kind to them even though they deserve to be destroyed.

Such amazing kindness from God ought to produce an attitude of humility. Unfortunately, though few of us would admit it, in our heart of hearts some of us believe that we deserve the gifts we get from God, that we are somehow better than those who have not been likewise favored. That’s pretty high arrogance.

Those who believe that they are blessed by God because they deserve it also, typically, aren’t very concerned for those not similarly blessed. When we believe that the reason God blesses us is because we somehow deserve it then we tend to also believe, though we wouldn’t admit this either, that those people not similarly blessed just aren’t as deserving as we are. The lost, the poor, the addicted, those broken up and beaten down are just getting what they deserve, we believe, and so we rarely offer them much help.

Arrogance and lack of compassion almost always go together. And so, when we who believe ourselves to be chosen and blessed by God do very little or nothing for those in need, we show ourselves to be frozen in self-righteous selfishness.

Dr. Pratt didn’t say this, but my thought was that there is perhaps nothing quite as ugly as this kind of a frozen chosen believer. For a person to receive from God the gift of eternal life, along with other spiritual and material blessings, thinking it is because he is somehow special, and then to have no compassion on those in need of the same gifts is really, really ugly.

Dr. Pratt called us to become unfrozen, or what I’ve heard others describe as the “thawed awed.” He called us to think about the gifts and blessings we have received, all of which come from God (James 1:17), and to think how we can use them to be a blessing to others. Having been blessed, how can we bless to others? Gifts are always given by God so they can be used for others sake and not kept for our benefit alone.

That’s something I’ve been thinking about for some time. It’s one reason I’m glad that God has called me to Ministries in Action. At MIA we don’t want to be frozen in selfish arrogance. We are committed to blessing others, even entire communities. Our vision is to take the gospel to the lost and to work with local churches for the transformation of neighborhoods, towns and cities through Christian community development, sharing with those in need out of the wealth of blessings that God has given to us.

Grace and Peace,

Barry M. Smith
Director of Theological Education
Ministries in Action
www.mia.org

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