Equalizing Grace

     At the heart of healing is an understanding that I am no better or worse that anyone else who is in the room. I can’t tell you how many 12 Step meetings I have been in and thought, “Man, I’m glad I’m not as bad as that guy,” only to hear the Holy Spirit say, “Man, he’s lucky he isn’t like you.” The lie that the devil uses to keep us from grace is one lie with two faces. One says, “You’re really not all that bad. A lot of people have done worse.” The other face is, “You are way too bad. God can never forgive someone like you.” Both are saying all sin is not equal. Healing begins when I recognize the insanity of that thought.

     Gordon MacDonald wrote Rebuilding Your Broken World. In it he says, “Scriptures do not focus on the individual actions or attitudes of sin; rather the focus is on the underlying attitude of evil or sinfulness that leaves us morally and spiritually vulnerable to misbehavior.” Whether it is a couple dealing with infidelity or a man struggling with an addiction to porn, we will not be made whole until we acknowledge sin as sin, and God as able to restore.

     MacDonald goes on to say, “All are sinners and stand on equal ground at the cross. All are in need of equal amounts of forgiveness and restorative grace. All of us are always in danger of the little invaders that enter our airspace and render us to a fallen state. And all of us need to know more about how to defend when the attacks come.”

     The grace of God is the same for all people and for all failures. He reaches down and picks up the drunk out of the gutter and the hypocrite out of the choir. He is just as interested in the drug addicts that meet at Branches on Saturdays as He is in the Anglicans that meet on Sunday. He is no “respecter of persons,” and He does not qualify mistakes. He loves us and forgives us all equally.

     That has some serious ramifications for the way we live our lives. It puts me in a position where it is impossible for me to judge or condemn anyone else. When the gay guy and the prostitute come into our worship service on Saturday night, they are under the same grace that I am. And I, if I remember His equalizing grace, will welcome them both into the family where we are all the same in the eyes of our loving, heavenly Father. I have been forgiven and that should be enough to keep me so thankful that I can do nothing but embrace my fallen brothers and sisters, welcoming them into God’s amazing grace.

Restoration In a Group Setting

      Henri Nouwen was a well written Catholic priest who died several years ago. He had a vision for the church to be a place of authenticity and healing in a way that was almost counter to what the church of today has become. If his message were summed up in one phrase it might be the title of his most famous book, “The Wounded Healer.”

     In that book he portrays a Chris,t and our call, based not on absolute perfection but on transparency. The power we have to offer healing to a hurting world is not in never having been wounded ourselves but rather in our willingness to share our wounds with others. We are all called to be wounded healers.

     That concept is never more evident than in the group. At the recovery center I am absolutely amazed each time I see a group of weak, wondering, wounded, people begin to be transformed into a community of caring  heroes. Men and women begin to move their focus from their own needs to the needs of others in the group and in a near mystical way, wholeness begins to emerge.

     We started a group for folks battling depression several months ago. We came together, not with some words of wisdom or therapeutic clichés’ but with a willingness to be honest about our own struggles. Over the last few months I have watched as that group has become a family. They encourage each other. They tell stories and cry together. They repeat helping lessons they have heard from other places. And they laugh/

     In fact, they laugh so much that I told them last week, “You guys are giving depression a bad name.” They are just fun to be with. The GOOD (Growing Out Of Depression) group is one of my favorite things each week. We even had a Christmas party. How about that? A depression Christmas party.

     We have a group for people with Chronic Pain. We are trying to begin a group for teens with eating disorders. One of our leaders is working on a group for women who just want to live a deeper life in Christ. You name it and we’ll come up with a group for it. After all we are nothing more than a bunch of wounded healers and I have a feeling that this is what the body of Christ is supposed to look like anyway.                Chonda

(Chonda Pierce is a best selling writer and Christian comedienne. She is also a founder and wounded healer at Branches Recovery Center.)