Jesus is Not a Flu Shot Part 4<\/p>\n
Here is the latest “wrinkle” I would call it, and maybe the final piece of the puzzle before this goes to the “masses”.<\/p>\n
This should be obvious.\u00a0 If I needed a heart transplant, I wouldn’t see a dermatologist.\u00a0 If I had blockage in my heart and needed major heart surgery, I wouldn’t listen to a doctor who scheduled my surgery with the leading brain surgeon.\u00a0\u00a0 Cardiologists are meant to operate on the heart.\u00a0\u00a0 Brain surgeons operate on the….brain.\u00a0\u00a0 If you are not following\u00a0this, you might need to see your doctor.<\/p>\n
I have been a pharmacist for 11 years, and I didn’t really see how much the church today really does not follow the common sense of the world.\u00a0 This is part of the reason the world does not take us seriously.\u00a0\u00a0 If someone says one thing, but does another, the world recognizes that as being a hypocrite.\u00a0 If the church does it, we tend to not even see it.<\/p>\n
We claim Jesus is the answer.\u00a0 Know Jesus, know peace.\u00a0 No Jesus, No peace.\u00a0 We proudly display the bumper stickers.\u00a0 We confidently mouth off the clich\u00e9s.\u00a0 Yet we have no problem saying Jesus is the Prince of Peace on one hand, and on the other, sending that woman with the issue of anxiety right to the “professionals”.<\/p>\n
Jesus is all you need!\u00a0 Here is your refill on your Prozac Mr. Jones.<\/p>\n
My question is why is there such a polarization between what we preach and what we practice?<\/p>\n
A common argument from the psychiatrists and nurse practitioners is “if God didn’t mean us to have medication, why did he give man the wisdom to discover it?”\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They also will state that if you had diabetes, you wouldn’t refuse medication, so why refuse medication for mental illness?<\/p>\n
First, just because man can discover something, it doesn’t mean God is for it. Man is constantly rejecting the ways of God and going his own way, and God simply says, “Have it your way.”\u00a0 God doesn’t force his methods and himself on mankind, but we still suffer the consequences.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Opium, tobacco,\u00a0cocaine\u00a0are found in plants, \u00a0and so is cyanide.\u00a0\u00a0 This doesn’t mean we can assume God meant for us to use them.\u00a0 We also are body, soul, and spirit.\u00a0\u00a0 Our bodies need physical healing and physical food to function.\u00a0\u00a0 If we break an arm we don’t go to a prayer meeting, we go to the ER.\u00a0 Yet if we are diagnosed with “mental illness” the church in general sends you to a shrink.<\/p>\n
The mad man of Gadara was soon found clothed and in his right mind.\u00a0 How did Jesus help him without a vast arsenal of mind altering drugs? I would say the argument we might think in our own minds is “Yes, but Jesus was performing major\u00a0miracles back then.” Or perhaps Jesus in human form had more power than today.\u00a0 Yet, why did Jesus say the disciples would go on to do greater miracles than He did?\u00a0Do we honestly think that a medical doctor or a psychiatrist is more powerful than Jesus?<\/p>\n
Or is the fact we don’t know how to help the serious cases leave us embarrassed or threatened or make us run the other direction?\u00a0 How would we treat the Mad Man of Gadara if he came into our church?\u00a0 Or the gay man of Gadara?\u00a0\u00a0 Or the pedophile man of Gadara?\u00a0 Or the Serial Killer of Gadara? I would say by our actions that we tend to think the Gospel can save anyone.\u00a0 Until it comes to someone outside our comfort zone.\u00a0 Those must be the reprobates.<\/p>\n
Is not the gospel the answer to a world that has none?\u00a0\u00a0 Is not Jesus the solution for someone who has come to the end of themselves?\u00a0 Far too often we offer clich\u00e9s over Christ, medication over the Messiah, Professionals over the Great Physician.\u00a0 Is there any reason why the world should take us seriously?\u00a0 Today they look over at the Mad Man of Gadara and see him drooling in church on Sunday from his Haldol, and at the shrink on Monday and back in the Psych Ward on Wednesday.\u00a0 And we look at him and wag our heads while we sing Victory in Jesus.<\/p>\n
The Bible says in Romans\u00a0chapter 6,\u00a0For he that is dead is freed from sin<\/em>.\u00a0 The gospel of John says And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0 James says A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.<\/em><\/p>\n Question:\u00a0 If the church claims Jesus is the answer, yet\u00a0denies that belief by how we handle those seeking answers.\u00a0 The church of the past 100 years seems to\u00a0assume the tough cases are “born that way”\u00a0 or refuses to take on the responsibility of properly discipling someone until they get it.\u00a0 The answers are in the Bible, so are we not looking for answers?\u00a0 Not open?\u00a0 Too entrenched on traditions of men\u00a0that worked 50 years ago?\u00a0 Or too busy knowing how much the true answers will cost us?<\/p>\n I am not guiltless in this.\u00a0 I\u00a0have\u00a0heard all the answers being a pharmacist but in my heart all I see is how compromised we are, and we pour out acceptable\u00a0ways to compromise what we believe instead of relying on the unchanging, and uncompromising Word of God.\u00a0 I hear I am not the one who prescribes these pills.\u00a0 My answer is if I was a prison guard\u00a0of the Nazis and ordered to pull the trigger, I would still not be guiltless.\u00a0 I hear there is a\u00a0lot of good in Pharmacy.\u00a0 There is a lot of good in going through a dumpster to find food, but that doesn’t mean we should.\u00a0\u00a0 They say God wants me there to be a voice.\u00a0 Yet, if I am say, a Christian\u00a0Porn Star, I\u00a0could be a voice there as well.<\/p>\n I am hearing so many different voices from the Christian world about what I should do with my pharmacy career.\u00a0 Maybe though I don’t need medication to help with these voices.\u00a0 Maybe taking a stand would be enough to silence them.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jesus is Not a Flu Shot Part 4 Here is the latest “wrinkle” I would call it, and maybe the final piece of the puzzle before this goes to the “masses”. This should be obvious.\u00a0 If I needed a heart … Continue reading