I don’t really like going to the doctor. My doctor is a very nice person. Most of the time I don’t leave the doctor bruised or injured in any way. Most of what I don’t like about the doctor can be boiled down to one specific task of the doctor: diagnosis.
Diagnosis is the process of arriving at the judgment that something is going wrong. When the doctor says, “you have high blood pressure.” That’s a diagnosis. And I don’t like diagnosis most of the time.
I should have seen a mile away. Grandma and mom passed along genes that made it possible. I helped it along with some bad behavior. It’s a lot like my sin. I inherited some bad stuff from my progenitors, but it isn’t all their fault. I did some stuff too.
The diagnosis of our sin is clear. God points out our sin in both its inherited and self-made modes. Just like when my doctor points out my illnesses, it stings a little bit. It comes with some consequences. It comes with some, “let’s try changing this behavior…”
But thankfully, it also comes with medicine. If I were left to my own devices to cure my high blood pressure…well, I probably would have stroked out by now. Instead, God brings us something from outside of ourselves that works in our bodies to fix the problem. We get medicated, receiving IV bags of forgiveness and grace.
Not only that, but we receive a promise. We receive the promise of a cure. One day we will be measured and tested and there will simply be no more evidence of sin in us. That Resurrection day will be the day that we celebrate in many ways, including never having to go to the doctor ever again.