YOUR DRIVER-ASSIST/CRASH AVOIDANCE SYSTEM

“I don’t like it!” was my wife’s first and most emphatic response to her new vehicle’s driver-assist/crash avoidance system. She was driving down the highway, and, as she drifted a bit close to one of the lanes’ lines, the steering wheel automatically veered sharply away. “It’s jerky!” she explained. The driver-assist/crash avoidance system does other annoying things too. It sounds beeping alarms if the driver begins to change lanes while another vehicle is in the driver’s blind spot. It also automatically slows when drawing near a vehicle ahead. It makes adjustments and sounds alarms and beeps. All are warnings to the driver. All are bothersome. But I am certain that these systems are going to save many lives, however annoying, at least at first, one might find them. Graciously, Creator God has included a driver-assist/crash avoidance into His design of each human. He has truly given each of us such a system to save us from wreck and ruin. Yet, people dislike, disdain, deny, reinterpret its signals, and blame nefarious origins and causes for it. Frankly, they “don’t like it.” Case in point: People with gender dysphoria who are seeking to transition or have transitioned suffer immense anxiety, depression, and extreme psychological trauma. The blame for this trauma has been attributed to discriminatory experiences these folks have had out in society—at school, work, social events, etc. COVID debunked that claim. During COVID lockdowns. when these were isolated from societal involvement and were totally out of social contexts where discriminatory experiences were possible, their psychological trauma should have significantly decreased. Instead, it increased. Why? Secular experts who have already written the narrative would never concede it, but these dysphoric folks’ treatment by society is not the real cause of the depression, disillusionment, dissatisfaction, etc., which they experience. Much could be said about how the fallenness of humanity is responsible for dysphoria, depression, and the rest, but there is also something else at work here. God has built into His image-bearers, each human, a driver-assist/crash avoidance system. God gave humans a conscience. Although the conscience alone is not always unerringly reliable—it can be hardened, misguided, seared, silenced, and skewed--it was designed to let humanity know what was right and wrong—in the sight of God and for their own sake. Whether codified in law or not, God has given folks this innate moral sense. He has even built into nature an observable order so one can tell what is “normal” and what is an aberration. So often when folks complain of depression, discrimination, and anxiety, in reality, they are experiencing the alarms, nudges, warnings of conscience, innate moral sense, and the effects of traversing the boundaries of the natural order. This uncomfortableness they want to blame on others and on being ill-treated by others. Although some are unjustifiably ill-treated, that is not the real source or origin of their unhappiness and anxiety. What they are experiencing is God’s created and installed driver-assist/crash avoidance system. This is true, not just for gender dysphoric folks. It is true of all folks. The inner uproar, the pain, is often the crash avoidance system sounding alarmed. (Of course, I am not suggesting that in every case all anxiety, depression, etc., is attributable to going against one’s conscience or the natural order of things.) In a vehicle with such a system, the more the driver does not take note of or ignores the alarms, the more he continues to maneuver in the directions and manner that triggered the system to sound the alarms, then the more insistent and persistent the system becomes. When one goes against the warnings of his innate system, the discomfort, the pain, the anxiety, etc., will only increase. To try to mitigate the unpleasantness of the alarms, disarm them, or harangue them does not relieve the person of the danger he is in. It only increases it. Ignoring God’s alarm system also only ensures the ultimate crossing of moral lines and the crashing and destruction of the person. Today, it is thought altruistic and compassionate to attribute folk’s misery of conscience, struggle with identity, and painful inner implosion to systemic bigotry, being targeted by conservatives, or discrimination from antiquated religious groups. Countenancing the dysphoria by legitimizing it and placing the blame for the resultant agony, confusion, and inner struggle on “hate” groups, do these no favors. It’s not being compassionate at all. It is becoming complicit in their misery and ultimate destruction. Those who suffer this pain need genuine compassion, healing, and the redemption of Creator-Redeemer God. They need Jesus and the wholeness He only can provide. Their misery is their crash avoidance system letting them know so. When my wife proclaimed she didn’t “like it,” I told her, “Well, there’s a button to turn it off. Just push it.” Some do everything possible to deflect, mitigate, and rid themselves of the pain of their inner crash avoidance system. Rather, they should listen to it and thank God He is trying to save them from wreck and ruin in life and eternity. He can save! He does rescue! He will not only warn, but He will also divert from destruction. Furthermore, He will make whole, complete, and fill with joy, peace, and a knowledge of true acceptance. We may not like our driver-assist/crash avoidance system or its constant clamoring. But we certainly need it. Do you hear the cacophony of its protests to your choices, activities, your living? Don’t harangue it with vituperation. Don’t let others tell you not to listen to it and that it's someone else’s fault you’re hearing it. Don’t turn it off. It’s trying to save your life, your soul. --Pastor Clifford Hurst