Whooping Cough and the Flesh

This past month, our local Lifestyle of Learning™ community of families has been suffering from a whooping cough epidemic. I had heard of whooping cough before, but I had no idea of how contagious and how serious it is until this month. I have to say, I know more than I want to know about whooping cough now!

For those of you who are like I was, not really knowing that much about it, whooping cough makes a person have coughing fits which are accompanied by violent stomach upheaval, and the inability to grasp a breath during the fit which can last up to 2 minutes. The name comes from the gasping sound that people make through the coughing fits. It sounds very much like drowning to me as I have tried to comfort my Lizzy (12 years old) through her coughing. The fits are very frightening, both for the one coughing, and the one trying to comfort the cougher. A person with whooping cough can have from 2 to 50 or more fits a day, and the coughing can last up to 3 months.

As our lives, and the lives of all our friends, have been taken over by this epidemic, I’ve been thinking of its similarities to the flesh (our self-centered nature without the influence of the Holy Spirit). I want to have nothing to do with this sickness!! I want it to leave our lives and never return!! This is the same way I feel about the flesh! Self-seeking and self-serving is something I want to be gone from our lives forever!

Whooping cough is not a personal sickness! Our whooping cough epidemic probably started with one person. Now we have 7 confirmed cases among us, and half a dozen more who have been tested and are waiting for their test results to come in. In the same way, your fleshly relating patterns are not a personal matter. So many believers think that their relationship with the Lord is a personal matter, and their need to deal with their own sinful ways is just between them and the Lord, but this isn’t so. Our fleshly (self-focused) ways of relating completely affect the people around us. This is where God’s work is in us. He wants to lead us in a process of reconciliation with the people in our lives. We need to make things right with people in order to be cooperating with God. If we are not learning how to love other people, we do not know God. (1 John 4:7-8) Like whooping cough, our flesh and the path toward freedom from it are not personal matters, they affect everyone around us.

This horrible sickness was spread among us so swiftly, because those who have it usually don’t know they have it until it’s too late. The beginning symptoms seem so common and unremarkable. This is the same with the flesh. Most people cannot see their own fleshly relating habits. They don’t even know they’re being so self-focused, and they don’t feel like it’s anything out of the ordinary. Our fleshly ways are comfortable to us, and many around us are doing the same things, so that we really don’t see just how self-serving we really are in our flesh.

As we began to discover this whooping cough sickness among us, the early seemingly inconsequential symptoms became highlighted. We began to look at sore throats and minor dry coughs in a whole new light. It’s the same with our process of becoming free from our flesh. First we must look at our day-to-day relating patterns in a whole new light. We have to become aware and begin to examine our relating more thoroughly in order to see and notice our fleshly ways.

Whooping cough takes time to become apparent that it is serious. It starts out with a minor dry cough or just a sore throat, but after a couple of weeks, the serious frightening coughing fits start. The contagiousness starts with the dry coughing. By the time we realize we have it, the damage to all the people around us is already done. We’ve infected them before we knew it was serious. This is the same with our fleshly ways. We’ve been relating selfishly toward our children and our spouse for years, often not even realizing we’re sinning against them. Our relationships are being damaged by our fleshly ways. It’s when it becomes serious that our attention becomes focused. We start to see the beginnings of rebellion or the full rebellion that results from the damage we’ve done while not thinking much of it.

Whooping cough is the most harmful for the little ones. It can be fatal for young children and babies. It doesn’t spread from baby to baby, but from adults to babies. This means that adults need to deal with the sickness in themselves for the sake of the children. This is the same with the flesh. At times moms see there is something wrong with the way they’re relating with their children, and so they decide they ought to be better moms. They become disappointed in themselves as they continue to sin against their children, and they tell themselves they need to try harder. However, the self-centered motivation to be a better mom will not result in freedom from selfishness. It is only when our focus is on becoming the best blessing for the sake of our children that we will have the right motivation for putting off selfishness. An angry mom will not become free from anger as long as she only longs to be a less angry mom. She must desire from the depths of her heart to spare her children from experiencing the harm of angry outbursts. She must deal with the anger for the sake of her children.

Unlike the whooping cough, the flesh isn’t contagious, but it certainly is enabled in other family members when loving relational habits are not in place. Fleshly relating patterns or “fleshfests” where family members are in an uproar are not caught from places or other people or from music or any other external source. Some wrongly believe that “flesh fests” are caused by an attack of the enemy. I’ve often heard Christians express, in error, that they believe the ugly relating between family members on the way to and from church is an “attack of the enemy,” because “The devil doesn’t want us to go to church.”  In reality, fleshly relating patterns come from within a person who hasn’t yet become dead to their self-centered nature. “Flesh fests” are caused by selfishness.

Whooping cough is so contagious, that the best way to stop the spread of it is for everyone to stay home. That way we won’t infect anyone else with it. It takes time to find out if other family members are going to get it, and so we are all staying home and dealing with it in our own families to keep others from being infected. We need to do the same with our fleshly behavior. We need to stay home so that we can deal with our relational habits and establish an environment at home where we can raise the standard of loving behavior and learn to obey the Lord. I was once talking with a mom whose teenage daughter was angry and ranting because her mom wouldn’t let her go out with her friends. The daughter set about pouting and being very nasty to her mother and siblings. The mom thought maybe she should let her daughter go with her friends after all. I said, “It’s not a good idea, you need to spare your daughter’s friends from her!” Developing a home-centered lifestyle goes a long way toward helping your family become free of their self-centered relational habits. You can focus on learning to love at home together.

Those of us who’ve been exposed to whooping cough have had to wear masks when we get around others. The masks hold back the whooping cough bacteria. In the same way, we need to hold back our fleshly behavior and keep it from pouring out on others. We must think of others and their benefit as we turn our hearts toward protecting them from our fleshly habits.

Whooping cough is a big bummer! So is fleshly (self-serving) relational behavior.

Let’s get rid of them both!

“Strip yourselves of your former nature [put off and discard your old unrenewed self] which characterized your previous manner of life and becomes corrupt through lusts and desires that spring from delusion; And be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind [having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude], And put on the new nature (the regenerate self) created in God’s image, [Godlike] in true righteousness and holiness.” ~ Eph 4:22-24