Charcoal and the cross: healing for toxic lives.

Charcoal cleans the water in fish aquariums, Olympic pools, municipalities, the International Space Station, and the contents of bottled water containers lining the grocery store shelf. It purifies the air in our homes, cars, places of work, and in nuclear submarines roaming the deepest oceans.

Charcoal neutralizes the leaching by-product of city dumps, the toxic chemicals from industrial smokestacks, and the deadly gases in chemical warfare. It turns sugar white and licorice black. It detoxifies herbicides and pesticides from farmers' fields and acts as a soil conditioner for gardens and lawns. Building materials compounded with charcoal insulate while adsorbing many of the volatile toxic compounds blamed for the "sick house syndrome."

Medicinally, activated charcoal (charcoal that has gone through a heating and steaming process that erodes it structurally, greatly increasing its available surface area) is used in hospitals, research centers, emergency rooms, poison control centers, and animal clinics worldwide. Because charcoal adsorbs ("binds with" as opposed to absorbs which means to "soak up") thousands of natural and man-made poisons, it is administered universally for poisoning and drug overdose.

Charcoal benefits such diverse conditions as indigestion, diarrhea, infection, pain, infant colic, the anemia associated with cancer, hepatitis, ulcerative colitis, poisonous bites, and poison ivy. Activated charcoal is used in breast cancer surgery, wound dressings, and is the blood-revitalizing agent in kidney and liver dialysis units. Who would have guessed? Simple charcoal--the by-product of burning wood--is armed with a science and technology about which those who create synthetic medicines can only dream, but never equal.

How is it that charcoal so positively impacts our personal health? Is it mere chance that it is so universal, so available, so affordable, so safe and easy to use?

I believe that charcoal is no accident. It's so perfectly suited to every class of people, every geography, and every climate that one can only conclude that this amazing material has been handcrafted by God Himself with man in mind. It's mysteriously simple; but within its simplicity there's a larger picture, an object lesson, a spiritual truth that invites us to experience total health.

Charcoal and Forgiveness

There's a story, set in Spain, of a teenager named Paco who became estranged from his father and ran away. The father, after years of anguish, goes in search of his son and ends up in the capital city of Madrid. After a fruitless hunt, the father decides to run an ad in a Madrid newspaper. It simply reads, "PACO, MEET ME AT HOTEL MONTANA NOON TUESDAY. ALL IS FORGIVEN. PAPA." The next day when the father arrives at the appointed place, there are eight hundred Pacos waiting for their dads.

Guilt, shame, remorse, estrangement; how many multiple thousands of "Pacos" today live with a spiritual heart sickness, longing for what no earthly medicine can offer--forgiveness? Not just earthly pardon, but more importantly, divine absolution.

Charcoal adsorbs (binds) to itself poisons that compromise our physical as well as our mental health. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we had a spiritual charcoal that could instantly adsorb all our guilt, all our regret and remorse, all our shame, our fear of retribution, and leave us with perfect peace and a clear conscience? Well, there is such a remedy.

Burnt Offerings

In ancient Hebrew ceremonial practices, a flawless lamb, in perfect health, was offered as a burnt sacrifice for the sins of penitent people. The guilt-stricken person confessed his transgressions over the animal's head, transferring them to the lamb. The sinner was symbolically cleansed from his crimes as the lamb was subsequently consumed by fire. The penitent believed, by faith, that in some mysterious transaction, God was able to cleanse him from the defiling poison of guilt, shame, remorse, and fear. Though the lamb was innocent, the penitent believed that it took his sins to itself. The charred remains spoke to the penitent of sins consumed and cleansed by fire.

Hundreds of years pass. With the years come countless thousands of sacrifices.

Then one day, beside the River Jordan, seeing a lone figure walking toward him, John the Baptist announces, "Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29)! The long-awaited Messiah has arrived. But, like the innocent sacrificial lamb, His life is cut short. Jesus is nailed to a wooden cross.

The Bible describes death as the consequence of sin. Jesus, taking man's sins upon His innocent shoulders, carried the poison of man's guilt and shame and laid them in His grave. In the spiritual sense, Jesus became a sin offering made by fire. But, just as adsorbing (binding) poisons to itself does not fundamentally change charcoal, accepting man's sins did not pollute Christ's purity. Here's how Bible writers describe the exchange: "The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6). "He appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin" (1 John 3:5). "By his wounds you have been healed" (1 Peter 2:24).

Jesus was and is God's universal antidote for guilt, shame, and disobedience. The apostle Paul, in second Corinthians chapter five verse twenty-one, explains that Jesus, who knew no sin, took upon Himself the sins of the world and became the blackness of sin for us, that we--each one of us--might be transformed by and to the purity of God. He took on the blackness of eternal death that we might approach unto His eternal light. He accepted our poison that we might enjoy His purity.

Miraculous Recovery

When charcoal removes the load of poison from inside us, our physical bodies rebound with health. When a son is forgiven and reconciled to his earthly father, a great burden is rolled away from his heart and mind. Just so, when the person, weighed down with a guilt and grief no man-made medicine can relieve, exposes his- or herself to the cleansing forgiveness of God, there's complete restoration.

Ruth, a registered nurse, tells the story of a miraculous recovery from poisoning. In hopelessness, a man swallowed a deadly pesticide, wanting to end his despair. On finding him unconscious, his rescuers immediately began administering the only two remedies available--pulverized charcoal and prayer. What should have been just another miserable account of suicide, or at best a life of severe physical and mental damage, became a testimony to the power of those two remedies. The Great Physician blessed the science of chemistry and the prayer of faith. But what about the state of mind that drove that man to attempt suicide?

Neither he nor his wife were Christians when their lives fell into crisis. But, because of the miraculous recovery, both were moved to learn more about the name Jesus--the name invoked for healing. Touched by the good news that, not only can God revive a poisoned body, He can also reenergize a guilt-plagued mind, the couple chose to take the name of Christ and be baptized. This action signified the death of the old--the washing away of their past sins--and the regeneration of the new life.

Though Ruth's story happened in rural India, it's played out a thousand times each day around the world as people attempt to extinguish the fire that torments their minds and hearts. Some are saved by the detoxifying power of charcoal. But how often are they offered a remedy for their sin-poisoned hearts?

Purity Power

The physics and chemistry of lowly charcoal bear an uncanny similarity to the work and ministry of Jesus. Charcoal makes raw sugar cleaner and sweeter. It removes impurities from vegetable oils and leaves them tastier and silky smooth. Charcoal makes water purer and more refreshing. It takes polluted air and returns it healthier and invigorating. All this and more, God's gift of forgiveness can do for you.

By His Spirit, Jesus goes to work to cleanse our minds from the defilement of sin and make us more like Him. He removes the stench of selfishness, the gall of bitterness, and leaves behind peace and joy. He adsorbs the poisons of guilt, shame, and the seeds of eternal death, restoring us to a healthy state of mind.

A few poisons charcoal does not adsorb at all. Others only poorly. Likewise, God's forgiveness does not redeem those sins that are not confessed or forsaken. When the mind and heart refuse to denounce their ongoing partnership with evil, there's no deliverance. But, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9).

Graphite to Diamonds

Graphite, charcoal, and diamonds share the same carbon building blocks. But they're structurally and aesthetically different.

In its simplest form, carbon congregates in planes and sheds easily--as in soft, gray graphite. But that same carbon, exposed to intense heat, changes into crusty but intricate, geodesic-like fragments. When it is again exposed to extreme heat and extreme pressure, the uninspiring black carbon is reborn into a dazzling crystal-clear diamond. Like the humble carbon, we too have a royal pedigree.

Bible writer John, enraptured by a vision of Christ glorified, penned these words of inspiration for all generations to read: "Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him" (1 John 3:2). "We will all be changed," announces the apostle Paul, "in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye" (1 Corinthians 15:51, 52). Then he clarifies for us the process for which we can all look forward. "When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: 'Death has been swallowed up in victory'" (verse 54).

Eternal Antidote

From the cradle to the grave, from the little hurt to the crushing load of guilt and sin, God has provided an antidote; a healing balm. The mystery of charcoal's benign power to heal is but a faint shadow of God's powerhouse of redeeming love.

So, when you feel all your goodness spent, your hopes consumed by seemingly unquenchable fires, when you struggle heartbroken and time crunched, and find yourself searching for answers that no one seems to know, remember lowly charcoal. Ignited, quenched, perished, and finally, endowed.

John Dinsley is author of Charcoal Remedies.com (Review and Herald), a book detailing the amazing healing powers of charcoal and the God who created it. John is a lifestyle educator, conducts public health programs, cooking schools, home remedies workshops, and stress seminars. He lives with his wife, Kimberly, in Apple Valley, Minnesota.