every 250 teenagers was infected in 1966; 15-19 year-olds have more incidence of gonorrhea and syphilis than all other age groups combined and doubled. Heartache, depression, anxiety, guilt, so cial disease, condemnation by peers are high prices to pay for a moment of sexual liberty. The words o f the ruined Oscar Wilde are ap propriate—“ I forgot that what one does in secret, he has one day to cry aloud from the housetop.” Passion is a cruel master and often leads to the BIG HANGUP! IV . POTENTIAL___________________________ Solomon, the Preacher in Ecclesiastes, comes to the human conclusion that all man’s effort is van ity—empty, without value and leading to frustra tion. He takes great pains to point out that all the dreams and plans of men are folly. Young people today are faced with the pros pects of their dreams being shattered. The crum bling of the future strikes a bruising blow. A mother cries, “He killed himself because he was drafted and it ruined all his plans.” The threat o f war, war itself, the draft, com petition, vying for grades, girls and the first string can produce either victory or defeat. Setting goals and hopes and plans and finding out that they just won’t be fulfilled can arid does produce tragedy. Everyday teenage dreams come true, while, at the same time, other teenage worlds are shattered. Young people with potential in varying proportions to their dreams are building a glorious world for themselves and often watch it eaten away bit by bit. Even when potential is realized and dreams are fulfilled, the nothingness and vacuum o f success indicate that the reality never matches the dream. I recently stood by the hospital bed of a boy, permanently crippled, whose body was crushed be cause he liked a girl and she dropped him for an other guy. He jumped off the roof of the gym at lunch hour. Teenagers still dream, but the world is too real to make all those dreams come true, and the poten tial o f so many is never realized. They seldom be come what they could have been and, if some do, they find it isn’t what they thought it would be. It is frustration because o f what they are not, or cannot be. Purposelessness, the past, passion and poten tial . . . These general areas simply stated, yet in almost immeasurable complexity, are the factors within varying degrees of mixture that so often result in the BIG HANGUP! The facts indicated in connection with each one o f the cases o f suicide in the introduction o f this article reveal that each o f the four problems is represented by at least one o f the cases. But, climactically, it is at this precise point that
the message o f the person o f Jesus Christ comes with the solution for each area. Purposelessness becomes divine purpose when we see what Paul wrote to Timothy (II Tim. 1 : 9 ) ; “ God, who has saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.” Through the person, Jesus Christ, comes pur pose—divine purpose, as every redeemed child of God becomes an integral part o f God’s divine mas terplan. God made us for a distinct purpose in His eternal plan; without that there is no fulfillment. The person who knows Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour has no problem finding purpose. He is a part of God’s glorious eternal purpose. He has a sense of eternity and indispensability in the operation o f a holy blueprint. And beyond that he has an awareness of absolute success in that pur pose as he proclaims with Paul, “ And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose .” In Jesus Christ, the past bears no consequences. God has removed our sin “as far as the east is from the west,” buried it in the “ deepest sea,” and even God “ remembers it no more.” This coupled with the continual cleansing of I John 1 :9 and the promise of “no judgment” in Romans 8:1 makes guilt a foreign element. God is in the business of forgiving the past. It is Jesus Christ, “ in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness o f sins according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:7). Then comes the promise “ If any man be in Christ Jesus, he is a new creation; old things are passed away; behold all things are become new’ (II Cor. 5:17). Passion and evil desire are replaced in the new man by a desire for that which is spirit- itual and godly. I Corinthians 2:14-16 shows the contrast between the natural man who cannot un derstand the things of God and the spiritual man, the new creation who has, literally, the mind of Christ. It is through life in Christ that he is able to think on things “ true, honest, just, pure, lovely, and of good report,” and continually “ set his affec tions on things above, not on things on the earth.” As far as potential is concerned, the promise of Ephesians 3:20 is enough to challenge the most creative imagination. Paul says “Now unto Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we can ask or think [did you get that?], according to the power that worketh in us.’ By Christ’s power working through us we can do not only what we dream, but beyond what we dream. Absolute fulfillment is in Christ. Thus, in every area, Jesus Christ becomes the answer to the BIG HANGUP! ¡ ¡ b \
MARCH, 1969
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