[*] I want a blind doctor?

I was reading the complete transcript of the interview Jason Janz did with Steve Saint and Mart Green, and I came up on this quote from Steve Saint:

In hindsight it seems like poetic justice. After all, I am the one that keeps challenging Christians to let their scars show. Wounded people want to be ministered to by people who have scars in the same places their patients have wounds.

I understand the point, I think: he's saying that if Christians come across as people with no sin, never have sinned, don't give sin the time of day like ivory statues, then there's no way for Christians to reach out to the world of sinners.

If that is his point, I think there is a kernel of truth in it. See: I think it is completely valid that we should not pretend to be something we are not. For example, we should not pretend to be people who do not see the appeal of sin. The question is this: do we see sin as more appealing than we see Christ? That is, we are certainly tempted every day, but what are we doing about temptation and what are we doing about renewing our minds?

We should not pretend that we are people who have no temptations and have no sin. But what we also cannot pretend to be is a people who are only tormented by sin. If we are redeemed by Christ's blood, we have victory over sin -- not just in justification, but also in sanctification. Christ's death secures our sanctification. In that, we are not a people standing around filthy and dressed in rags: we are not dead men in tombs anymore. We are facing Christ, and are clothed in Christ's righteousness, and becoming more like Him every day.

If we are not, we have to ask ourselves if we really belong to Him, amen?

But the problem I see in Steve Saint's statement here is that he thinks that I am only relevant to the unsaved sinner if I am willing to demonstrate that I am a sinner. I think that is exactly wrong: if I am just another sinner, I have nothing to offer another sinner. What is relevant to the sinner is the solution to a sinful life.

If I was going blind, I wouldn't go to a doctor who had the same problem I have but couldn't heal himself. I'd want a doctor who, in the best case, had a track record of healing people like me, or in the worst case, was able to cure his own blindness to show he could heal mine. I would have no interest in a blind doctor who might be able to sympathize with where I am right now.