Tuvok's Help or Jesus' Help?

Greetings Scholars and Warriors.

A few days ago my Mom and I were watching some Star Trek Voyager. We are slowly going through the series and currently in season 2. One of the episodes we watched was regarding a murder on the ship.

Found at tomdurham.com

As Tuvok was investigating it, he quickly found the evidence and got a confession from the murderer, a man who had been part of the Maquis crew. With all of this completed, something still bugged Tuvok. He could not understand why the man had done this atrocity. All the guy said was that the crewman had looked at him wrong. This troubled Tuvok so much that he actually chose to mind meld with the murderer. As a result of this, the murderer received more ability to control his impulses, but Tuvok was left rather off. Soon, the doctor had to get involved and complete a series of treatments on Tuvoks brain. These treatments left him with none of his mental shields around his emotions. At one point, he almost killed a man.

I found this to be an interesting view of sin. Ever since Adam we have struggled to make sense of a world filled with horrible atrocities. We often find ourselves asking "Why?" just like Tuvok was asking. And just like the Maquis man, we often get caught in sins we are not proud of and need some sort of repression help to deal with them.

Jesus came and spent time with people just like this Maquis man. People who were caught up in sins like drunkenness and non-marital sex. Unlike Tuvok, as Jesus helped them, He didn't fall prey to their sins. Hebrews 4:15 tells us:

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

We can get our help from Jesus with no worries. He has experienced temptation and won against it so He is able to lead us. When He was praying in the Gethsemane, He fought against temptation so hard he was sweating blood. To contrast that, his disciples were busy sleeping and not praying. Even after he had encouraged them to "pray so that you will not fall into temptation" (Matthew 26:41). Simply put, we were not there for Him when He both needed us and wanted to help us. We should be there for each other.

Acts quotes Proverbs 27:17 in this:

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

We saw the principal of cooperation and support throughout this episode. The Doctor did all he could to help Tuvok. Captain Janeway was more interested in seeing the murderer be reformed than in seeing him be punished (not that she ignored punishment). The next time you see someone struggling with a sin, be patient with them. If someone comes to you, just pray for them or with them.

No on should be afraid to ask for help dealing with sin. Often our strange Christian/American culture is good at shaming people over sins. Jesus isn't.  He is good at helping. We should follow in His steps. Maybe you need someone to pray for you. Maybe you need someone to bug you from time to time to get you on track.