Means, ends, and finally breathing

    A half empty bottle of Adderall lies somewhere around my room.  It gathers dust as evidence that no one is scrambling to find it in a half awake attempt to medicate their Attention Deficit Disorders.  ADD is a funny issue, some people claim it doesn't exist, other people claim to be totally debilitated by it.   For me, it does exist as not as a disorder of the way I think but rather an outcome.  I just think differently.  Which is okay, however, it only becomes a problem when I don't have the discipline to accomplish what I need to accomplish.  Discipline is not moving past my ADD but working within it.  Adderall for ADD is only effective longterm if used in order to help build patterns of discipline so that when off the ADD medicine a person finds themselves able to focus.
It is a problem in society today that rather than treating ADD with therapy and counseling in order to build discipline we simply medicate it.  The medication acts like a noise gate, cutting off all noise above and below a certain level so you only have a smaller range of frequencies coming out of the speakers. Because it cuts off the distracted effects of ADD often people just stop there.  But this does nothing to help you.  If you don't actively seek out discipline to help you focus and live more efficiently then in the long term you accomplish nothign but a break from your ADD.

    This is using what is intended as a means as an end.  The medicine is supposed to be used not as the final solution but in order to help you build discipline. 

    Sometimes in the church we use worship as an an end.  Singing becomes worship instead of the vehicle for worship.  An organized theology becomes the end goal rather than greater knowledge and intimacy with God.  We use standards as the end of spiritual development rather than the the means to spiritual development.
Rules are essential to discipline.  If we struggle with pornography it may be best to unhook from the internet for a while to keep from temptation.  This is a fence that you build to keep yourself safe so you can become stronger.   However if you don't struggle with pornography but you unhook he computer to keep yourself from temptation than whats the point?  It quickly becomes legalism as you are no longer keeping the rules for the glory of God but rather for the sake of the rules.  iN this way we use standards as the end rather than the means.  The image that following standards presents is a false image of godliness as it does not accurately represent the spiritual maturity of a person.
   
Can standards grow a person spiritually, yes.  But only if the spiritual maturity is there first in order to use the Standards as a vehicle to discipline and glorifying God. 

I apologize for typos, I didn't edit :)