Actually Being Changed by Jesus

Last week I attended a conference in Dallas where a group called Gungor led worship. One of their songs entitled You Make Beautiful Things goes like this:

You Make Beautiful Things

All this pain
I wonder if I’ll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change at all
All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found
Could a garden come up from this ground at all

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

All around
Hope is springing up from this old ground
Out of chaos life is being found in You

You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of us

You make me new, You are making me new
You make me new, You are making me new

As I thought about those powerful lyrics it hit me that there would be almost no way a hymn writer 40 years ago or more would ever write a song with those kind of words. They simply didn't think or speak in those terms. That's not right or wrong, but just the way it is.

But is the notion of pain and brokenness something new? Of course not! It may have looked different, but it was still there. This brings me to the issue I want to raise for us:

It seems to me, based on my experience at least, that often people in older generations experienced just as much pain, shame and brokenness. They simply stuffed it and hid it from others. They didn't want to "air their dirty laundry." Yet keeping all of that stuff tucked "in the closet" didn't make the problem go away and certainly didn't give them true spiritual victory.

On the other hand, I often see people in younger generations transparently wear their pain, shame and brokenness on their sleeves, talking about it to whomever will listen sometimes, including indiscriminant followers on Twitter and Facebook. In essence, they are very comfortable sharing their stuff, but they aren't necessarily interested in being made well, gaining spiritual victory over it. In fact, many of them can't see past the garbage at all and assume they are stuck.

To me both approaches are wrong and mutually destructive. One keeps you locked up and hidden away and the other keeps you stuck wallowing in the garbage. Neither brings true freedom in Christ or the spiritual victory Jesus promises us.

So what are we to do? How can we stop hiding on the one hand and stop wallowing on the other in order to actually be changed by Jesus?