I was in a vision clinic outside of Port-au-Prince helping people to find glasses that will help them see or read better and I was talking with a young lady who had a child with her.
I asked if she has ever decided to put her trust in Christ - whether she was able to become a Christian and she said that she was going to put it off until she paid someone back that she owes. I was puzzled until I discovered that the person she owed was a voodoo priest. I asked her why she connected the two and you could just see on her face that she wanted to wait until she was done owing the voodoo priest money before she turned herself to God in any way. She felt like she was connected to something dark and needed to rid herself of that before she turned to the light.
I told her that she is free to turn to God at any time - in fact it would probably be best to turn to God when you are entangled in things that are dark. In fact, none of us can hope to 'shape up' before we come to God - it is in the act of coming to God in the midst of wherever we are that God does the 'shaping up.'
Well she wasn't hearing it. So for a $56 loan she was not interested in doing anything at the moment. And to be honest I was glad to help her with her eye problems . . . but it reminded me of how sweet people can be made to feel in bondage to things that are not good for them. It reminded me of last year sitting on a playground bench in Belize talking to a gang member after some basketball. When I asked him if he went to church, he said that he was going to wait until he was done with selling drugs and being a gang member. I remember telling him that now is the best time to get right with God, don't try to do it yourself.
Again - it fell on deaf ears. We want to get ourselves out of our messes and then come to God.
If only we could see that the way to get out of the mess is to let God do the dirty work.
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