November 2009

But God, who comforts the depressed, comforted us by the coming of Titus.
2 Corinthians 7:6 (NASB)
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“God uses people to refresh people.”  David Wilkerson

The Garden of Eden is the indefensible testament to broken relationships.  The single focus of the Bible changes from relationship to aloneness, from seeking to hiding, from being naked and not ashamed to hiding beneath hastily crafted exteriors of guilt.

From that one damning act of rebellion came the horror of aloneness… that gripping and dark reality that is the driving force in hearts today.  Don’t think me too dramatic, please.  Human beings are both driven to relate and committed to hiding at the same time, a paradox that is at the core of every relational anguish that we share.

The modern result is often some level of depression, a word that is highly misunderstood and rejected outright by the too spiritually minded.  None the less, it is an accurate word picture of many.  Life for many is a road filled with potholes, depressions if you will, that slows down travel and jars a world sometimes to the point of breakdown… an experience all too common in life.

The story of the Old Testament is the story of the sons and daughter’s of Eden who had lost their way, and of a God who followed.  Separated from God and one another, the skin of guilt covered every child born and soon became the norm, no longer recognized as the problem and instead becoming the identity.

It is interesting, don’t you think?  The final years of history before Christ are known as the Silent Years.  Four hundred years of silence from heaven.  Centuries of separation.  How could anyone continue to believe in a God who cared?  It is because our DNA is coded to only survive through relationships with both God and man.  No matter what the cost, we will wait and hope for someone who cares.

Jesus wiped away every vestige of fear and rejection, demonstrating the Good Shepherd to lost mankind.  His favorite word for God was simply “Father.” He was the answer to man’s separation and His cross became the bridge between guilty mankind and a holy God.  But it did not stop there.  Once the cross was planted on Golgotha, the wall of separation created in the Garden by sin crumbled at the foundation.

“He is our peace and has broken down the wall of separation,” declares Paul, “that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace.” At the cross, the death toll began.  The wall of separation between Creator and created was put to death.

The first defiant act of grace was the torn veil that separated common from sacred.  Torn in two from top to bottom Mark states, leaving nothing to the imagination.  The separation was done.  Intimacy was now to return first between God and man, and then between the sons of men.

That is why Paul’s words are so arresting.  He was writing to the church at Corinth, a church who’s passions went from the sacred to the sinful in a heartbeat.  Paul had written a scathing letter due to their lax attitude concerning the sin of one member.  His love for the church broke his heart and placed him on the potholed road of depression waiting for their response.

Finally, he confesses his fear of the broken relationship,

We were afflicted on every side: Outside were conflicts, inside were fears.

He loved them enough to tell them the truth and suffered in the telling over the potential of a broken relationship.  Sound familiar?

But here is the beautiful part.  God came to comfort him.  God came to console his heart.  God came to bind up the wound and heal… and He did it through a friend named Titus.

But God… comforted us by the coming of Titus.

I would rather have God send a miracle than a man.  My independence demands anonymity, not a hug, yet our Father is committed to showing His grace through His church.  In fact, He delights in using us to bring his most precious gift of comfort.  He is the God of all comfort and anoints and appoints you and I to deliver the goods.

The greatest gift God has given us is Jesus… He is our peace.  But peace without restored relationships is little more than a truce waiting to be broken.  Jesus though has broken down the dividing wall between God and man, bringing everlasting and complete restoration, and the blessing continues to give.  Even the shame between the children of Eden is gone.  Restoration between men has come.  The Father commissions us to give His most prized possession, the comfort of God, to one another.

Do you know someone who needs comfort?  It is the simplest way to display the mercy of God.  Do you need to receive comfort?  Then expect it from the simplest of saints.

Now go and do the work of the ministry.

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