What Some Of Us Were

[dave c]

HEALING SHELTER MINISTRIES #131c Re-Written 12NOV08 http://groups.msn.com/AHealingShelter/welcome.msnw

Save Me Today—Part Three: What Some Of Us Were

by rev dave c

I ask you to take a moment to close your eyes and picture “the good life.” Obviously, there is going to be a lot of variation regarding the details within that picture for each individual, but there are probably a lot of things in common between your vision and mine. I think that in their heart of hearts most people envisage a life with more than just enough to eat and drink—a safe, clean and attractive environment—other people who need, love, and respect them—successfully overcoming challenges and adversities—a good measure of physical and mental stimulation—a sense of gain and growth—freedom from all that would enslave them—knowledge that the things they care about will be passed on to the next generation. Old/young...black/white...conservative/liberal...atheist/Christian; I believe we all share those dreams of how we would like for life to be lived. Now tell me, did you picture broken homes, children without parents, financial disasters, an empty knowledge that life is meaningless, starvation, horrible diseases that are incurable, addictions of all types, unwanted children, sex with whomever and whenever, senseless violence, a home and community drowning in pornography and obscenities, suicide and euthanasia? Probably not.

Until 28 years old I was a self-styled hippy wannabe who believed that everyone (especially me) should be allowed to do whatever I wanted to do. Then, one evening in 1980, during a painfully honest conversation with someone who had much the same attitudes, desires, and experiences, we came to realize that we (and our friends) were the most intolerant, bigoted, and pointlessly defiant people we knew. In the space and time of one hour, our lives began a 180 degree turn. What took place? We were both from progressive families, we both went to the same university—we were both young, talented, bright, and ready to take on the world. We both firmly and sincerely believed in the inherent goodness of humanity’s collective spirit. We both held the arts as our true religion. We had both gone through a “married with children” relationship that didn’t fit our concept of what our life should be. We had both spent more than a decade living a life of self-indulgent promiscuity and wanton hedonism. We had both suffered the fear of violence and disease. We had both lost friends to drugs, prison, and homosexuality. We had both experienced the presence of evil as an almost tangible entity. We were both cold, afraid, and starving for commitment, real love, and the very same traditional values that we had worked so hard for so many years to reject. The reality of the consequences for daily decisions had caught up with the shameless lusts and arrogance of youth.

The epiphany described above was not a Christian conversion experience—but it was the beginning of my desire to feel clean and whole, to start the process of moving out of the darkness, and to make a real commitment to someone, somewhere. It was a necessary step toward my understanding that I needed change and to be changed. Two years would pass before I came to realize that I not only needed Christ to forgive me and to become my Savior, but that I actually wanted Him to do it. I accepted Jesus into my life during the spring of 1982. Since that time there have been many ups and downs in my commitment and faithfulness, but He has always and repeatedly proven Himself to be true, constant, and consistent.

In Romans 6:20-23 we read: When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (NIV). Paul then tells us in Second Timothy 2:22, Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart (NIV). When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me (1Co 13:11; NIV). The problem with an “anything goes” agenda rests in the inability to draw limits on social freedoms. While it sounds good to say, “We should all be able to do whatever we want, whenever we want, and with whom we want,” that philosophy just doesn’t work as it’s being played out in the real world. If killing the pre-born is ok, what about old people (and the sick or infirm)? If homosexuality is ok, what about polygamy (and pedophilia or bestiality)? Sometimes walls and dams aren’t just to restrict our drives and ambitions—they’re for our protection. Once we tear them down, we must face all the consequences of their destruction, not just the initial rush.

First Corinthians 6:9 Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. 12 "Everything is permissible for me"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"--but I will not be mastered by anything (NIV). And that is what some of us were. But we were washed, we were sanctified, we were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. Thank you, Lord, for so great a salvation. Amen.