Monday, September 28, 2015

Treatment and Prognosis for a Church with constipation or diverticulitis



In the physical situation and medical world, when the problem has been recognized and diagnosed correctly a course of antibiotics will clear up the infection and improvement will be seen within a few days, and given that the problem has been dealt with the sufferer will be able to get back to normal life easily.
For the church  - acknowledging the problem is the first step, and visiting the Master Physician is the second.  For a diagnosis in the medical world a CT scan and a barium enema will confirm the problem, but for the church, and individual Christians, asking God for a spiritual X-ray is a good way of seeing the problem.  “search me O God and see if there is any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting”.  Psalm 139:24.  This gives the Holy Spirit freedom to search, identify, and highlight the problem and reveal the appropriate course of action needed to solve the problem.  Physically if you’ve had all the tests, and given a bottle of pills to take, they are actually no good at all unless you actually take them, in the spiritual realm the same is true, when God has shown us what we need to do, we need to act on it in order to bring healing, and renewed fellowship with God.  1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness”
Of course the church is made up of many parts, but every member, if they take this seriously enough will deal with the individual problem and sin long before it begins to infect the whole body.  Sometimes it takes the united efforts of the body of Christ, to warn, and encourage members to take the medicine. 

In physical situations, serious problems may have to be dealt with by operating to remove the infected, or worse gangrenous part of the gut because the body is no longer able to fight it, and its continued presence could have dire results for the body.

Spiritually this would be a radical step, and it is very rare that church leaders would ever be bold enough to do spiritual surgery, removing people from the church.  Maybe the time has come that some people, who are false teachers, or are causing destruction and damage in the church should be asked to leave the church, for the sake of the health of the local body of Christ.  Maybe though, for the church in the ER an operation is urgently needed if there is to be hope for survival and recovery.

What’s the prognosis?  Actually it is very good, if the problems are indeed dealt with, but in order to prevent future problems there needs to be regular times of discarding waste – confession and prayer for forgiveness and cleansing. Preferably each one of us, needs to daily ask God to search and know our hearts, or better still we should be sensitive to the prompting of the Holy Spirit as he convicts us when we have sinned, and will call us to address the issue immediately. 

Physically when this has been a problem, the patient needs to watch their diet a bit, taking in healthy foods which will protect them from being faced with the problem again.  For us spiritually we too need to watch our spiritual diet, and discern what is helpful, healthy and beneficial for our spiritual health.

O Lord, have mercy upon us, that this problem may not be true of us.

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