Looking beneath the surface
This week we’ll hear from our student pastor, Colby Flowers:
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I have dealt with shoulder injuries for half of my life: I have dislocated both shoulders (left one 4 times). Now shoulder injuries are complicated because if you injure it once, it is highly likely you will injure it again since the socket and ligaments are looser.
The first time I injured my shoulder, we popped it back in and put ice on it and I took some pain reliever. The second time I injured it during practice and had to go to the ER. To determine what to do next, they did a scan of my shoulder (which is looking deeper under the surface). They determined it would heal back but this will likely keep happening. They gave me two options: 1) have surgery and be out 6-9 months with no baseball or 2) rehab and be back in a couple weeks. Well this was a no brainer for my teenager logic.
Then the summer came and I was getting out of my friend’s pool using the ladder My foot slipped causing me to fall to my left side and my shoulder popped out again. Despite this happening three times, I did not seek to repair it with surgery but just rehab. Surgery is harder and a longer recovery but it would fix the problem that I can’t see on the surface. Rehab coddles my shoulder back to some degree of use but it was not a real solution. I was just kicking the can down the road. Here was the problem: I was not addressing the problem but finding a short-term, low-cost scheme to keep doing what I wanted to do. I was going to keep up the same pattern of injury, frustration and missing out.
Well once I made it to college, I injured it badly in a game and I was done for the year. This time, we got another scan of my shoulder, and it was worse than ever. I had a full tear and ligaments were damaged. The only way to fix it now was surgery. They had to get under the surface and repair it (surface-level treatment was not enough). I had been avoiding the bigger issue of fixing the problem with a surface level, quick-fix that would not last.
The point of all this is that we can attempt to fix something but unless we get to the root of the problem, it will continue. We might fix it in the short-term but no lasting change will come unless you tackle the problem head on. This is true when it comes to our actions and behavior. What we do is always motivated by what we desire and think. Our desires can be positive or negative but it is what motivates us. Jesus helps us to understand that to experience the life-change of the Ten Commandments and the Gospel, we must look internally before we try to correct the external.
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Thanks Colby for the encouragement to deal not just with the surface issue, but to press to the heart of the matter. This is how Jesus approached sin, trying to get to the heart issue, not just the outward action. Take some time this week to read Matthew 5:22-23, 27-28 and answer the questions below that Colby shared with the students.
Questions for Reflection
- How do our desires/thoughts and our actions relate to one another? What does Jesus say about anger and lust?
- Why is it important to focus on what we desire and think before we try to correct our behavior? Why do we tend to just focus on our behavior?
- Where do we sin first: body or heart? Why?
- Can we change our desires by ourselves? How does prayer and scripture help change our desires/thoughts?
- What is God’s solution to changing our behavior? (reference Ezekiel 36:25-27) How do we receive this new heart from Jesus?
Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash