SUNDAY MORNING

from the pastor

May 19, 2002

I arrived home last night about 9:30 after spending some time this past week in Baltimore, Maryland at the John Hopkins Conference on Complementary Medicine and Spirituality. Since it was dark when I got in, I was eager to get up this morning and look outside to see what new flowers have bloomed since I left last Sunday. Several have, but I can’t tell you what they are, as they are new to me. It is fascinating living in a house for the first year, observing what treasures the yard yields, left by gardeners of the past.

The conference I attended this past week gave me some solid introduction in areas of health care and healing that are new to me. Complementary medicine is made up of healing practices that follow different paradigms than conventional medicine. Some forms of complementary medicine include: acupuncture, chiropractic, therapeutic massage, transcendental meditation, vibration technology, herbal therapy, aroma therapy, and Reiki. We are in the early stages of understanding and evaluating the benefits and problems found in Complementary Medicine. It is a promising field, however, as conventional medicine is ineffective 40-80% of the time in alleviating pain and suffering. We already know that a ‘pill’ is not the whole answer to our problems of physical pain.

The conference was not only an introduction to Complementary Medicine, but it was also an introduction to the approach that major religions of the world take toward sickness and health. Speakers gave presentations on Catholicism, Protestantism, African American religion, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and Taoism, Maharishi Vedic approaches, Native American, and Hispanic cultures.

As I came away from the conference, I found myself pondering our own WellSpring project here at Grace--our ministry of healing and renewal. I believe that the church has much more of a role to play in the area of healing than we have previously thought. Current healing practices in our community are competitive and fragmentary. There is often little communication between practitioners of conventional medicine, complementary medicine, and mental health (even within those fields!). Spiritual and emotional powers for healing are discouraged by many practitioners of conventional medicine.

I think the church has two important roles we can play these days. First, we can be an integrating component in the community. We are in a unique position to gather together people in conventional medicine, complementary medicine, mental health, and spiritual healers. Second, we can address people who are suffering. It may be the doctor’s job to prescribe the pill, use the knife, apply the needle, and plan the regimen. But it is the individual’s role, a vastly larger role, to live the illness, to journey toward health, to WANT healing, to cope with difficulty, to author wholeness for ourselves, to LIVE rather than exist. I look forward to further conversation on healing and spirituality with you, and to further development of our WellSpring project here at Grace. --Mike

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