Dying Like You May Live.

Colossians 3:2-3 NIV “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.”

Daddy! Daddy! Is he dead? Is he dead, daddy? Is he dead? I felt panic rise as I tuned into my 3-year-old son screaming at me from the other side of the hospital’s emergency ward. Subconsciously, I knew him to be over there to retrieve his toy car, but it took a second for me to connect his wailing to him watching someone, in a stretcher, being unloaded from an ambulance that had just pulled up. My panic increased as he thwarted my efforts to calm him down. It took several attempts to convince him that the guy was not dead. He was here because the doctors were here, and they would make him all better.

Reliving that memory for even a second reminded me that it really was a harrowing experience for me. It was not a far stretch to relate that story to my experience with Christianity and my involvement within the Church. But, in doing that, I got to stand aside and, filled with awe, contemplate the majesty and mystery of my Lord’s ways. I’m that little guy in the Church today, ‘way over there, struggling to comprehend what I’m really seeing as I watch wounded sojourners stagger through the doors, barely clinging to a hope that has somehow been placed upon their hearts.

As I observed from that distance, the temptation arises in me to scream: “Are they, dead Father? Are they dead? Those who said ‘yes’ but remain chained to anxiety, fear, shame, guilt. Those filled with self-hatred, self-loathing, self-judgment, and low self-esteem; and those who confess with their mouth that Jesus is Lord yet radiate doom and gloom, pessimism, despair and make utterances of hopelessness? Are they dead? Are they?” Grace and mercy wash over me as my human response says ‘no,’ but His response flows in and says: ‘No, not yet!’

In God’s ‘hospital’ – the Church, people do come to die (though they may not know it as they step through the doors) so that they may be healed by being reborn and re-establishing their identity in the Kingdom of Heaven. It is in that place where the things of the world go strangely dim, and thoughts of invading our enemy’s kingdom arise and blossom into a desire to be difference makers. It is there that we seek validation for our lives from Jesus only, and, in His strength, the world will experience our love and call us Christians.

It is obvious today that wisdom fills the gap between that time in the hospital with my son and this time in the hospital of Christ. It also closes the gap between believers and non-believers.

As a Christian, I am thankful that I have been granted wisdom within the spiritual gift of mercy. To have the eyes and heart to seek the lost, broken, and lonely so that my life may be used to guide them towards the Light that saves. In the days of my unbelief, sitting in an emergency room, I am thankful that I was granted wisdom then also. Upon seeing another ambulance backing into the bay, I was inspired to call my son to me and share my newfound wisdom with him: “Do you see that ambulance backing in over there? There is someone in there, and they are not dead either!”

Ah, The Wisdom of the Lord leads to peace and comfort. His ways are always delightful!