Home Remedy

I Corinthians 3:19 --"The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God."

She stood there, leaning over my counter space with a pleading look on her face. Her argument was that we'd worked hard all week and were entitled to a night on the town, a night to let down our hair, knock back a few and dance until the music in the very crowded bar came to a stop.

I just sat there, shaking my head.  I grew up a Missionary Kid.  I dance like it. I'm not comfortable in bars because I drink like an M.K., too - which is to say, I don't. But I really did want to spend time with my friend. I was torn between doing what my heart wanted to do and doing what I knew God would really want me to do. I told myself I'd make a good compromise and tell her that I'd be the designated driver.  That got me out of drinking and I could still go watch everybody else get really stupid and give the appearance of moral support.

But, once there, walking into the foul, smoke laden air, hearing shouts from my tipsy so called "friends" and  watching the wreck of a volley-ball game in the sand littered with cigaret butts out back beyond the deck - I wasn't so confident that I really WAS anything moral - let alone support. I didn't stay very long and was immediately grateful that I'd driven in my own car. I lit out there like the place was on fire. I ended up with a fellow M.K., watching a newly released Disney Movie and loved every single minute of my night off from being a single Mom.

I learned this: those with a broken heart and a touch of loneliness frequently head out to a place full of rowdy people and a rip-roaring "happy hour". My friend wanted a night on the town - hopefully putting a little substance into that great big hole in her life. But by two in the morning, when the bars close down for the night, she was back at my apartment, sitting on my couch with her head in her hands, tears falling down her face. Just as empty as she was when she took off for her wonderful "night on the town." Only now, along with the emptiness, she had to fight nausea and a horrible head-ache.

I call these nights, home remedies. Not to knock a few good 'ole fashion homeopathic solutions to what might ale you, but because indulging in these moments makes me think of trying to heal a wound with turpentine [I have family members that still swear by this method of antiseptic] - or downing a spoon full of Caster Oil every night to promote good digestive health.  In these particular home remedies - there is no true healing. Turpentine burns like all get out and it tends to encourage scarring. Caster Oil just makes you sick and leaves a bitter taste in the soft pallet of your mouth. The are things that might take your mind off of the immediate painful symptoms for a short time, but they don't heal the thing that's causing the discomfort in the first place. Much like the smoke hanging low in the air of the crowded bar - these remedies eventually dissipate, vanish, they are nothing solid. Why do we do this to ourselves?

In a little book called Hope For Each Day by Billy Graham, I was reminded of I Corinthians 3:19. Stepping into the heard shuffling it's way to the noisy local night spot might seem like a good way to forget one's troubles or alleviate a case of the blues - but it doesn't really heal.  There is nothing in those places that can truly fill the missing pieces of our lives. Our Savior is the only REAL medicine, the true healing and complete fulfillment. Everything else is just foolishness. A way to put off dealing with what's really going on, a way to avoid rolling up our sleeves and digging into some pretty tough changes that need to made within ourselves.

In his letters to the churches, Paul reminds us that we aren't OF this world. We are only IN it.

I won't be the designated driver again.  I don't want to encourage others to seek out small, shallow comforts in a way that only deals out more damage and deeper scars. I don't need to pretend that I fit in. Because I don't. I'm not really supposed to.