“Your teeth look good.”
Whew… I mentally relaxed. I hadn’t been to the dentist in about 4 years. I was afraid of what the dental hygienist would say about my teeth. The fact that she commented pretty quickly that my teeth initially looked good was a comforting feeling. Maybe that tooth that hurt was just a small cavity and nothing major.
After all, I flossed whenever I had steak or chicken. That’s usually when it was uncomfortable because there was some food stuck in there. I brushed every morning. And I brushed irregularly in the evening prior to bedtime (depending on whether I either remembered or wanted to take the time). That’s good enough, right? I’m sure there isn’t anything real major going on.
I think we all think that what we are doing in our lives is good enough. Surely there’s nothing major really going on. We walk (or run) through life with this sense that there might be some reason for that dull pain in the back of our teeth, or that unsettled feeling that life is a bit off, but we don’t have neither the time, nor the inclination to entertain or engage with what might be just, well, gas. I’m not trying to cheapen these thoughts that may or may not be there for some. I just think that when we are all really honest with ourselves, there is something much deeper and more sinister going on that we either don’t want to acknowledge or think will go away sometime.
At least, that’s what I thought about my teeth. I really hope this isn’t a major problem. It can’t be that bad, can it?
Yep. It can.
The only positive thing I heard in the visit to the dental office was that initial comment that later turned out to be false. My teeth were not good.
As soon as the hygienist and the dentist looked at my X-rays behind that extremely comfortable recliner I was in, I think I could hear a gasp and sense some rapid exchange of glances and non-verbal indicators that things were not good in this patient’s mouth. At first they said “three.” By which I took to me three cavities. Then that number grew to 5 or 6. Then it was unclear what the final count was.
Well I guess my dental care regimen was not as good as I thought.
Not only did the X-rays indicate some major problems, but deeper inspection of my gums revealed that some wonderful tarter was unwelcomingly stuck alongside of my teeth. During the hygienists “cleaning” and painful removal of this tarter, I was instructed that regular flossing is supposed to take care of tarter underneath the gums instead of a professional once every 4-5 years. She asked me, a 34 year-old adult man, if I had ever been taught how to floss. I knew my mouth was in deep trouble at this point, so any answer in the positive would only bring about condemnation from the hygienist, so I replied: “I thought so.”
Her reply? “I don’t think so.” Ouch.
She proceeded to jam a piece of floss so deeply into my gums alongside of my teeth that my whole body cringed. “Nope,” I said. “My teeth definitely don’t experience this every night.”
Was she serious? Is this how flossing was supposed to go? No wonder why people don’t do it!
Somewhere during this painful cleaning, the professional I would soon have to pay, said: “I guess your teeth weren’t as great as I thought they were at first glance.” Ouch.
I got to tell you… what she said right there made me realize something I think was rather profound:
At first glance my teeth looked great. But the dental professional knew better than to rely solely on outward appearances. Only when they probed deeper under the gum line and were able to see what the naked eye couldn’t see, did they give a more proper diagnosis and prescription.
My life can easily look great on the outside. One thing we humans are pretty good at is outward appearances. However, we all know what life’s really like where others cannot see. And sometimes, our character is even cracked and decaying in places we know nothing about.
This is where the Gospel of Jesus Christ comes in. Humanity has cracks, holes and decay in places that no human professional can fix. Left to ourselves, we will always choose self-preservation, pride, unforgiveness, selfishness, and our own happiness at the expense of others. Regular habits of prayer (where we depend on someone outside of ourselves), reading Scripture (where joining God’s story happens regularly), and engaging with Jesus-following-type people (where communal accountability and encouragement is found) are important. But one cannot engage in these habits without a reason, without a relationship.
Sitting in that dental chair that afternoon, I resolved to myself that I would floss. Why? Why had I not flossed regularly my entire life? Why had I forsaken something I was taught was a good thing, but for so long had neglected?
Because I was laid bare. My insecurities and embarrassment of not flossing and the amount of cavities and tarter build up I had were exposed. I couldn’t hide. It was a crisis moment.
It was also a decision moment. Which way would I go? Would I floss and brush regularly from now forward? Or would I continue on as before? Would I choose the way of good, regular habits? Or would I choose the same as before, which led to pain?
Therefore, I believed in the Good News of proper dental habits and routines.
The Gospel of Flossing
Only time will tell if I really believe, right? I mean, I could say I believe, but if my practice and habits don’t change, then I really don’t believe, right?
Same thing in our lives. When we come to a crisis moment… when we come to the end of ourselves, will we 1) trust and believe in God as revealed in Jesus? Or, will we 2) carry on as before and continue to experience pain and our humanly undoing?
And even if we say we believe… do we really? If we say we believe and our practice and habits don’t change, then we really don’t believe, do we?
The Bible calls this evidence of belief fruit. Only time will tell if belief really took root and is growing.
Do you know how dentists judge fruit? Six-month check-ups. If I “believed” in the gospel of flossing, they could accurately judge my “belief” based on how much tarter and cavities I had in my mouth.
As a believer in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, our fruit is judged by the character of our lives. Anyone can judge whether or not we really believe in the way of Jesus by watching how we interact with others, our integrity when no one is looking, and our ability to forgive when we are wronged (among many other things). A Jesus kind of person should look, in increasing measure and degree, a lot like Jesus.
That’s my goal. I want my dental hygienist to tell me in six months that I really believe. I need her to tell me that. I need these check-ups to keep my belief in check as well as remind me of what my mouth used to be and that I never want to go back to my old way of dental neglect.
As a follower of Jesus I want my small group, my close friends, my wife, to tell me that I really believe. I can try to look good on the outside… and it can work for a bit. But eventually the neglect and decay will catch up to me, and I will be undone. I need authentic, Christian community to keep me in check and remind me of who I used to be so that I will never go back.
The verdict was in:
9 cavities!
How embarrassing.
No matter what I believed, I still would have to go through the pain of the consequences my previous life before flossing caused. You see, just because I believed in the Gospel of Flossing did not erase the decay in my teeth that had caused those 9 cavities. I was going to have to experience several subsequent dental office visits, several mouth-numbing shots, and a whole lot of drilling. I couldn’t just tell the dentist: “No, wait! I believe, I believe! Please don’t drill out these cavities!” Of course the dentist could let the decay keep rotting away my teeth, but he would strongly encourage me to fix it now before it got much worse later. My belief in flossing and my future desire to not have any more cavities did not “undo” the poor state of my mouth. I would have to endure the consequences of my previous actions.
I wonder if new Christians are often disillusioned because the way of Jesus seems to be fraught with pain initially. For some, life has to change radically in order to follow Jesus (they have 9 cavities). For others, living as a follower of Jesus won’t take that much (they only have one cavity). In either case, there is some pain as a newly christened flosser tries to reorient his/her life.
I got to tell you, that first cavity they went after on the first follow-up visit was a big one. The dentist gave me a fifty-fifty chance of having to have a root canal or not. He wouldn’t know until after he excavated the decay. If he didn’t see a canal, then I would be spared this further pain. I don’t know what the dentist would say, but in my non-expert opinion, I think I lost ⅓ of my tooth on that excavation and drilling (actually, I lost most of my tooth to decay, not the dentist’s drilling). It took an hour to do this tooth with me wondering the entire time what the outcome was going to be.
Sure enough, once the dentist pulled away from my tired mouth, he said: “I think you’re going to be fine. I don’t see the need to have a root canal just yet. If it continues to hurt we might, but if it doesn’t, then I believe you narrowly missed a root canal.”
Whew! There is a God!
The third visit was tense day of wide-opened mouth and lots of numbing shots (for some reason, my mouth does not take just one round of shots to numb, but three rounds!). This just reinforces my belief in the Gospel of Flossing.
I know that my new-found faith will be tested when I am done with the other six, painful cavity fixes and am about one-month in. Will I still floss? After the pain has subsided and my every other week visits have stopped, will I still believe and practice these new habits?
Only time will tell.
“I believe, I believe. Help my unbelief.”
Photo credit: Gemini Ai