February 22, 2010

 Be Careful of the Band-Aid!

For the last several weeks we have been talking about trust.

On January 27, my uncle went to his doctor for what was supposed to be a normal check up. They found that he was bleeding, so they sent him to the hospital. Once there they gave him a colonoscopy, in an attempt to find the source of the bleeding. They thought they found it and fixed the problem. Twenty four hours later they found that the bleeding had not stopped, the blood was actually collecting above the place they had repaired.

They were attempting to stop the bleeding again and did not have a doctor who could repair the problem, so they were attempting to stabilize him and get him to another hospital, where there were doctors who could handle his condition. They couldn’t get him stabilized, so 24 hours after they thought they fixed the problem, my uncle passed away.

They thought they had fixed it and what was at one time a controllable situation became an emergency that ended in death.

As I thought about what happened to my uncle I thought about our lives. It may not be a real bleed and it may not end in physical death, but how many of us or people we know have been through experiences that were controllable and ended in spiritual, emotional or relational death?

The death of a dream or vision.
The death of a ministry.
The death of a marriage or relationship.
The death of an opportunity.
The death of our finances.

When the situation first occurred it was not handled correctly.

Maybe we should have called the police on the abuser and put him or her out of the house and in jail, but our fear of being alone caused us to allow them to stay in the home and continue to abuse our children, physically, emotionally and verbally. We told our children and ourselves that it would be all right because we were afraid and did not know what to do.

Maybe God gave us clear direction as it related to what He wanted to do in and through us and we decided to go our own way. We ran from the Lord and your friends gave you their opinions instead of seeking the Lord with you. They just couldn’t see what God was showing you.

Maybe it was a marriage that was struggling and we decided we were not going to put up with it any more so we quit, gave up, let it go, instead of getting the counseling we needed to work things out. We decided not to even communicate how we felt about the situation. Now here we are trying to get into another relationship carrying all of the baggage and hurt from the first or even the second one. We did not handle the issues correctly when they came up now here we are in the same situation all over again.

We are hurt because of what happened. We did not know how to handle the problem, we were not equipped and neither were the people around us so we put a band aid on something that really needed surgery and kept going.

The result of our poor attempt at dealing with the problem is an infected situation. It is worse than it was before. That routine issue has now become an emergency. It is an emergency because you find yourself repeating the same bad behavior you learned. You find yourself running up credit card debt at a rate that there is no way you will ever be able to pay back. You find yourself going to the casino or resorting to drugs to try to make yourself feel better, trying to cover up the real loneliness and the issues you are dealing with and all that does is lead to other problems -a crisis.

Because we did not handle the situation when it was first diagnosed, now it is worse. Now the situation is an emergency, no longer can it be handled by a routine visit to the doctor’s office, now we need major surgery. The cost is greater and the recovery time is greater, because we did not catch the problem early. Failure to handle it early has resulted in your carrying around something dead for the last few months or years and if you don’t know, you need to know that dead things stink, they smell, they decay.

It is important to make sure that you get the right diagnosis for your problem and that starts by going to the right doctor. Start with Jesus and then allow Him to lead you to those He has chosen specifically to care for you. Don’t go to people that are just good at putting on bandages, because bandages don’t help in serious situations. You don’t have an owee or a scrap you have a deep cut, a laceration, something that may need stitches. Your situation my require a real specialist who knows the inside and out of his or her trade. This is no time to go to a novice, somebody who is just practicing. You need somebody that knows what he or she is doing.

My uncle needed someone who could repair his aorta. He did not need guess work or a quick fix. He needed somebody who specialized and so do you. We need somebody who will help us get to Jesus and the people that specialize in our specific issue.

You don’t need the person who tells you what they would not put up with if they were married to your spouse, because they are not.

You don’t need somebody who is not even dealing with their own problems and issues and wants to keep their own mask securely in place.

You don’t need someone who does not have the ability to diagnose a problem.

In Matthew 17:14-21, the story is told of the healing of a demon possessed boy. The disciples could not cast out the demon. They were walking with Jesus, but they didn’t have enough faith. So the truth is that we can become specialists.

The Bible says, Jesus Heals a Demon-Possessed Boy. 14 At the foot of the mountain, a large crowd was waiting for them. A man came and knelt before Jesus and said, 15 “Lord, have mercy on my son. He has seizures and suffers terribly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. 16 So I brought him to your disciples, but they couldn’t heal him.” 17 Jesus said, “You faithless and corrupt people! How long must I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” 18 Then Jesus rebuked the demon in the boy, and it left him. From that moment the boy was well. 19 Afterward the disciples asked Jesus privately, “Why couldn’t we cast out that demon?” 20 “You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.[a]”

I told you that they were able to stop my uncle’s bleeding or so they thought. The right person would have provided the right diagnosis and got him to the other hospital immediately. That is not what happened. I told you the people responsible for his care thought they fixed the problem until 24 hours later, when it was too late they realized they had not. My uncle had been taken to the wrong place. They did not have the specialist he needed. The people providing his care could not diagnose or fix his problem, they provided a band aid or quick fix that did not work and resulted in an emergency and his death. They only had 24 hours to figure it out. How much time do you have left?

Has your situation or issue been covered up with a Band-Aid?

• Are you using credit cards to pay monthly bills instead of dealing with the real issue-overspending?
• Are you staying in a relationship that is tearing your family apart, because you don’t know what else to do-you are afraid to be alone?
• Have you been abused and you don’t know how to deal with it, so you put your mask on and act, yes, I said act, like a person in a TV movie like everything is ok?
• Is your marriage in trouble and you are hiding it, because you can’t let anyone know that you are not the perfect couple?
• What about rejection, trust issues, loneliness, insecurity, lack of love-these are all conditions that need a specialist?

How many band-aids are you wearing, one on the knee, one on the elbow, one on the mind, one on the heart? It is time to be real with God and to be real with yourself. Ask God to lead you to someone who specializes in dealing with your condition, before it becomes an emergency. Let’s take the band-aids off and save them for the scratches and scraps. Band- aids were never meant for lacerations, wounds, bruises and deep cuts. Let’s clean the wound and find a specialist to help lead us through the healing process.

If you are not a specialist and you have been operating outside of your specialty area, stop applying band- aids and get those you care about to a specialist. But realize if you are willing to put in the time and effort necessary you can become a specialist, it takes time, it takes faith, it takes knowledge of the Word of God and it takes obedience to the Word of God. If you are willing you can specialize in removing band- aids and helping those you come in contact with walk in true healing.

Scripture:
Matthew 17:14-21:

Jesus Heals a Demon-Possessed Boy

 14 At the foot of the mountain, a large crowd was waiting for them. A man came and knelt before Jesus and said, 15 “Lord, have mercy on my son. He has seizures and suffers terribly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. 16 So I brought him to your disciples, but they couldn’t heal him.”
 17 Jesus said, “You faithless and corrupt people! How long must I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” 18 Then Jesus rebuked the demon in the boy, and it left him. From that moment the boy was well.
 19 Afterward the disciples asked Jesus privately, “Why couldn’t we cast out that demon?”
 20 “You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.[a]”