Do any of the following apply to you?
* I say stupid things when I drink that I would
never say when sober.
* I golf, go to sporting events, go bowling with
the guys and always get inebriated while doing so.
* Most, if not all, of my socializing involves
drinking.
* I’ve been told numerous times by my doctor that
I need to stop drinking. But I continue to drink anyway.
* I tell myself I can stop drinking any time, but have
never actually tried.
* I say I will have “just one” before heading out
on a Friday night, and end up driving home inebriated after several drinks.
* Sometimes I can’t remember the details of the
night before due to drinking.
* I’m wracked with guilt the mornings after I
drink.
* I despise alcohol-free weddings and gatherings.
* I
stop drinking for a month, and, thinking I now have it under control, begin
drinking again. I am able to stop “at one” for a weekend. The next weekend I
start to drink more than one. Then I start drinking during the week again.
After a few weeks, I am right back where I started, or worse. I am once again
proving to myself I cannot “control” my drinking. I cannot control alcohol. The
truth is, it has taken control of me.
The weirdest thing, the thing that is truly
incomprehensible, is that the above scenarios are not even blinked at as being
weird. They are perceived, if given a second thought at all, as funny,
acceptable, or normal.
I come from a family tradition of alcoholism. I say tradition,
because although I do believe some of the literature that says alcoholism can
run in families, I am not convinced that it is a biological trait. And I do not
put it in the category of disease, unless, of course we are talking about the
general fallen state of humankind, called sin.
I believe alcoholism is a sin. And I believe this because
everybody I know personally who drank and wanted to quit were only able to quit through
Jesus Christ. I know of one person who quit for many years on their own, but
began drinking again. I know of another person or two who are also in the dry
camp without Christ, but I don’t trust that it will be forever (because I’ve
seen others “quit” without Christ and it hasn’t lasted).
Those who have allowed
Jesus to reach down and take alcohol out of us are those who have been freed: no dry
drunks (meaning sober but miserable and still psychologically wanting to drink).
Scripture tells us those who have been forgiven much love
much. I have been forgiven for my past drinking. My love for God goes
deep for freeing me from the prison of alcohol. And lest you think you have to
be falling down drunk, think again. The above scenarios do not always involve
falling down drunk.
Problems that arise from drinking don’t immediately appear
with “just one,” but they do take root with “just one” because “just one” is
what leads to one more. And another. Until we get to the point of the old
adage, “One is too many and 100 isn’t enough.”
If you want to test whether you’re addicted, I advise going
this weekend without alcohol. And next weekend too. And the weekend after
that.
To test whether you have control over your drinking, I
recommend stopping at one drink every time (and don't drink at all the majority of days). Also, attend a wedding
and don’t drink. Go to a sporting event and stay sober. Watch the game at home
without a brew. If you find you don’t enjoy yourself; if you find yourself
missing that drink; if you are agitated and can’t concentrate without a drink
in your hand, then, my friend, you have a problem. Oh, and if you don’t like
your drinking buddies as much when you are sober? I think you know the answer...
See, many people think they have their drinking under
control until they attempt to actually forgo even one drink. Many deny that
alcohol has infiltrated their life to the point of dominance until they try to
go without. Only then do they realize
that, in spite of what they thought, they really cannot do anything without at
least “one drink.” They are surprised to find that they don’t enjoy being with
people unless they drink. They are alarmed to
discover that their main coping mechanism for stress has been to open a beer, uncork
a bottle of wine or whip up a cocktail (ditto for celebrations).
Once a person tries to sincerely go without a drink, or to
“stop at one” and fails, that’s when reality hits: they don’t have control and
they can’t “stop any time.” The alcohol is in control, not them.
Our culture rages at drunk drivers who kill, domestic abuse
at the hands of drunks, crime committed by those under the influence. Yet it
turns a blind eye to the wasted years spent in the fuzziness of alcohol, to the
endless reliving of drinking stories in conversation, of making fools of
ourselves or embarrassing others while inebriated.
Our culture doesn’t want to acknowledge the toll alcohol
takes on marriages and families: affairs that happen under its influence,
spouses ignored due to its luring away of the other spouse, liquor-induced
depression, a parent who goes to the tavern after work instead of coming home
and spending time, sober, with the family, and children who grow up believing
that their parents’ modeling of the drinking life is normal.
But we don’t answer to culture. We answer to God. And when
it comes to putting down the drinking life for good, God Himself through Jesus
Christ is the answer.
“I do not understand what I do. For
what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not
want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself
who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me,
that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I
cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I
do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do,
it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
So I find this law at work: When I
want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight
in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging
war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at
work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this
body of death? Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Romans 7:15-25
“Those who live according to the
sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who
live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit
desires. The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit
is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to
God’s law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot
please God.
You, however, are controlled not by
the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if
anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if
Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive
because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the
dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life
to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.” Romans 8:5-11
5 comments:
It's amazing how blind/unaware I am to myself. You describe a moderate drinker, (I can't imagine going a week without alcohol-it's been decades)- the cycle of guilt and self loathing in the morning, followed by the afternoon of "Hmmm, can't wait for my next beer" can continues indefinitely. I am currently wrapping myself around the historical reality of the Miracles of God, but surely the miracle I could never imagine would be to end this cycle.
Thanks for sharing, Glenn. I can totally relate.
As painful as the journey from blindness to awareness is, it is also the way that strongholds are torn down. Only then can we experience the joy of the man in John 9:25 who exclaimed, “I was blind but now I see!” Funny as it sounds, discovering who we are, in all our wretchedness, is the “good news” of Christ, because then we also get to see who we can become in Him. It isn’t up to us. Only God through Jesus can change hearts. Nothing ever changes in our own power.
We so easily define our behaviors by our own terms. But should I really be the one to diagnose my condition? Certainly there is a conflict of interest (which is why judges recuse themselves from cases in which they cannot maintain impartiality)!
The “cycle of guilt and self loathing” that you mention, followed by the desire for more of what brings the self-loathing on, accurately describes the life I lived for 21 years. But since I didn’t fit the traditional alcoholic paradigm of walking the streets drinking out of a paper bag in the middle of the day, or losing my job, etc., I told myself that I didn’t have a problem. But I knew I had a problem.
It took coming to the end of myself to finally bust my pride so I could humbly admit that I knew nothing about the Good Book that I was raised to despise: the Bible. I had tried everything to quit drinking and it didn’t work. I knew that there was absolutely nothing to lose by trying faith in God (and essentially, that initially took the form of believing His Word, which is what brought me to initial freedom from alcohol).
Long story short, the Bible gave me Jesus, and Jesus showed me who I was. I learned that He paved the way for me to die to that person and be born anew. I have not had any alcohol, nor the desire to drink, for 14 years. It is freedom born of full repentance, along with the acceptance of Christ’s forgiveness and His Spirit, which came to live in me when I surrendered.
Only when I was transformed by the conviction that God’s Word is True (that in fact it is the Word of God), that I am accountable to what it says, that Jesus Christ died for my sin and rose again did I stay sober. And Jesus is with the Father, interceding on behalf of His children.
“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” Romans 11:33a
I work with addicts and alcoholics and am in full agreement that this is a sin condition more than it is a disease. Some may have a predisposition to alcohol/drugs but it is sin that creeps in for this disposition to be birthed. We choose to drink, we choose to have sex outside of marriage, we choose lie, cheat, and steal. We do NOT choose to get heart disease, cancer, etc.
The discouraging success rate of modern addiction counselling and research is because of, I believe, it looks at addiction as a disease and therefore focuses on therapy models and pharmaceuticals. While there is benefit to these approaches, the benefit is minimal compared to viewing addiction as sin issue and recognizing the Christ is the ONLY cure for sin.
I work with addicts and alcoholics and am in full agreement that this is a sin condition more than it is a disease. Some may have a predisposition to alcohol/drugs but it is sin that creeps in for this disposition to be birthed. We choose to drink, we choose to have sex outside of marriage, we choose lie, cheat, and steal. We do NOT choose to get heart disease, cancer, etc.
The discouraging success rate of modern addiction counselling and research is because of, I believe, it looks at addiction as a disease and therefore focuses on therapy models and pharmaceuticals. While there is benefit to these approaches, the benefit is minimal compared to viewing addiction as sin issue and recognizing the Christ is the ONLY cure for sin.
Hi Chris,
I completely agree! God's blessings on your obedience to serve Him in this capacity! Barb
Post a Comment