The Placebo Effect

I was listening to a popular medical radio program the other day when someone called in asking a question about Diet Pills and whether or not they really work. The doctor responded with a chuckle as he began to explain some fascinating research. I can not remember the exact research results that he gave, and I have not done a lot of research myself on this topic, but I can remember the main points which I will share with you.

The first thing he mentioned is that many of the diet pills that are on the market are nothing more than a placebo. A placebo is defined as a sugar pill, or as an inactive pill with no medicine contained inside of it.

The second thing that he mentioned is that studies have shown that the more that a placebo pill costs, the more effective the placebo pill is. Researches have done case studies to prove this point, the more something costs, the better it works.

Now, I could go a lot of different directions with this, but immediately I began to think of Christianity in America. Unfortunately I feel that many are offering nothing more than a 'placebo religion'. I would define a placebo religion as a religion that speaks to nothing deeper than our feelings, yet never produces the actual change that is required in the new birth experience. The scriptures say, Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. This scripture implies that in the new birth experience we are spiritually changed! It is more than just a 'feel good' experience, but there is something intrinsically different about us. When we fail to offer the new birth experience in it's entirety, we are offering a Christianity with no spiritual medication.

There is another principle that is interestingly discovered in the research surrounding the placebo affect. The more something costs, the more effective it is. In a world that is trying to make living for God easier than ever before by watering down certain beliefs, we must understand the principle that the more costly something is, the more power it has to change. In the scripture we find that Christ understood the cost associated with the New Birth Experience by spilling his own blood on Calvary according to Acts 20:28. It was not a cheap price, but it cost something very dear, His own life. How can we, as 21st Century Christians expect to get by on anything less but total surrender to Christ? To think that it is even possible to be in good standing with Him without surrendering everything to Him is purely a humanistic religion. The scripture still speaks for us to take up our cross and follow him. The cross many times seems cumbersome. It costs us a lot to rearrange our lives around the cross, yet being a disciple of Christ is not living out of convenience, but it is living out of surrender!

Many are searching for nothing more than the Placebo Effect. The signs of it are everywhere in our day. Churches want a large crowd whether lives are really being changed or not. People want the resurrection experience without dying on the cross. We want the promises in scripture without the discipline of walking in biblical principles. Lord, help us to communicate a message that truly changes an individual by going deeper than simple feelings, into the actual flesh of the heart! When Christ comes back, he is not coming for a church that feels good, but He is coming for a Church that has been washed in the blood of the Lamb.