As I write this many of our members are either going through, or will go through, rehabilitation to help them overcome broken bones or surgery. Many of you that read these words have already gone through this after having had surgery. You know, probably better than I, how this works and the pain, commitment and perseverance it takes to go through this.

The physical body is amazing in many ways, and it can recuperate in ways that doctors themselves are amazed. It also has the ability to adapt – to compensate when one of the members of that body has been critically injured or lost.

Our spiritual lives are the same way. We must grow and exercise ourselves unto godliness. It takes pain (1 Peter 1:7), commitment and perseverance to grow to the point that God wants us to be. But, unfortunately with many Christians, they are not willing to pay the price. When the pain of trials comes, their commitment to Jesus and His way falters, and they quit. They don’t exercise themselves unto godliness (1 Timothy 4:7-8) and have not exercised their senses to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:14). Could it be that some of us need to go through rehabilitation to get back on track, to use senses that have become dulled by sin, to persevere until we become what God wants us to be?

And let us consider the body, the church. We have had to adapt in many ways because some members have been cut off and lost. They were not cut off because of surgery to get rid of the cancer of sin, indeed, we hardly ever hear of churches practicing that kind of discipline anymore. No, many of them fell off because of their lack of growth, and they withered up and fell off. As a result, the rest of the body, the church, is working under a handicap.

I believe it is time for rehabilitation. It is time for each of us to look at our spiritual bodies and see if we are really growing, or if we have become lazy in our work for the Lord. It is time for us to realize that we need to go through some pain and exercise to build up some spiritually flabby muscles. We need to not only read, but memorize Scripture. We all need to work at becoming teachers (Hebrews 5:12-14) instead of being taught. And that means a lot of hard work in studying the Scriptures and, more importantly, applying them to our lives. We need to persevere, to commit ourselves to hanging in there no matter what! As we make plans for the new year, can we not commit ourselves to becoming what the Lord wants us to be?

And for the church, it is time for rehabilitation. It is time that we encourage one another, especially those who are withering up and dying. It is time that we help those parts of our body that have become weak. We need to help them exercise and grow to their useful place in the body. We need to be committed, totally, to the work God has given us to do. And we need to persevere until the end (Revelation 2:10 -- It is interesting that when John wrote this he is writing to a church).

Let’s all go to rehab!