Intervention: The Help An Addict Needs

by Stephanie Tucker, MDAAC, M.Min.

As he slammed the door to leave, Ann felt that sick, queasy feeling in her stomach. She knew what was next. She always knew what was next, and the chaos and frustration left her paralyzed. Brad promised to quit time and time again. But his promises meant nothing to her anymore.

Ann tried to hold their life together the best she could. She cared for their two daughters and worked a job to pay the bills. But she knew this couldn’t go on. All her efforts to make Brad quit failed. One part of her had love and compassion for him, she knew some of the things he has been through. On the other hand, Ann felt angry, betrayed and let down by his selfish need to go use drugs.

You may have a “Brad” in your life. He or she may be drinking alcohol excessively, using street or prescription drugs or finding another way to “get high” You may be a parent, a spouse, or a family member that simply can’t grasp how someone can continue down this road of insanity. That’s because the behavior of addiction is what the bible calls a stronghold. In full swing, addictive behavior spins completely out of control. The addict no longer chooses to use, the addict must use because of the physical and emotional dependency – and the spiritual nature of bondage.

There are no words that can describe addiction – it is a personal hell that destroys life and relationships. The addict can behave in ways that are inexcusable, yet, as horrible as it appears, the addict is in a self-destructive crisis that requires authentic love and intervention. If we could look at addictive behavior on a diagram, we would find its roots buried back to much deeper issues. Most addicts have already been vulnerable to addictive behavior long before touching a substance. When they pick up alcohol or drugs, it seems the perfect to deal with life.

What Should I Do as a Family Member?

While understanding the nature of addiction is essential, it’s important to understand how you can intervene. In step one of the twelve- step program we are to “admit we were powerless over alcohol (drugs, a person, etc.) and that our lives have become unmanageable.” Dwell on that for a moment. Does it fit your situation? Are you dealing with an alcoholic or addict and simply don’t know what to do? Do all your efforts to “help” seem to only make things worse? If it feels that way, it’s because in some ways it is true.

A person with addictive behaviors won’t respond to manipulation, rationalization or control. In fact, that only makes matters worse. What will an addict respond to? An addict has to come to that place of defeat, realizing that he or she is powerless over alcohol and drugs and that his or her life has spun out of control. When a person reaches this point, he or she will be ready for help. Normally, a person experiences a desire to change when the painful consequences of the addiction have exceeded any benefits. Family members easily become consumed by the addict’s behavior. They are often trying to protect, help, change and fix the addict, while at the same time feeling resentful and angry. Their efforts to “help” the addict in fact oftentimes allow the addict to stay in his or her disease. How so? If the family members can prevent the painful consequences from being felt by the addict, the family members also prevent the addict from hitting that “rock bottom” place where he or she will want and desire help.

Some ways family members prevent consequences include:

Continually bailing someone out financially

Providing housing for an adult child that should be self-sufficient ·

Calling the addict in “sick” to an employer ·

Bailing someone out of jail repeatedly ·

Believing lies and manipulations in order to appease the addict ·

Blaming self for the addict’s drinking or using

How Do I Intervene?

Educate yourself about addiction. The more you can educate yourself about addiction and treatment through a Christian perspective the more prepared you will be in understanding your role in the overall addiction cycle. We have a multitude of resources on our website and can offer you additional information if you are interested.

Understand Codependency. Many times, family members take on characteristics known as “codependency.” This behavior, although it appears good on the outside, is just as toxic and dangerous as the substance addiction itself. Visit our codependence blog at www.christiancodependence.wordpress.com.

Learn to Set Boundaries. You will need to learn to set firm boundaries with the addict. This essentially gives you the ability to love the addict, but refuse the negative behavior in your life.When you learn healthy boundaries, you will stop unknowingly enabling the addict in harmful ways. You may need to stop financially supporting an adult child or physically separate from a spouse (we do not encourage this, especially divorce, but in some circumstances, it is necessary).By allowing your child, husband or wife to face up to his her behaviors in church, work and home, there is a chance that he or she will be closer to wanting help.

Schedule an Intervention. Some people choose to coordinate a planned intervention. This can be a great alternative if you see someone sinking into the depths of addiction. The general idea of an intervention is to clearly and lovingly express your intolerance of the addict’s behavior. You also point out the ways in which the addict’s behaviors have hurt you and other family members/friends. Through an intervention, you must remember that the addict has deeper issues that drove him or her to use in the first place. Simply screaming angry, shaming and frustrated words won’t help, it will in fact cause the addict to run. Through an intervention you are essentially saying that you refuse to tolerate the negative effects of addiction, but you are standing by with love and encouragement, understanding the addict truly needs help. This approach should be gentle, yet firm, with clear-cut consequences if the addict refuses to get help. Most interventions offer the addict an opportunity to get detox or treatment immediately, with a pre-planned option in place.

What if The Intervention Doesn’t Work?

Interventions don’t work if they are not properly presented. Family members close to the addict often have a difficult time being objective: they are prone to either overly protect and defend the addict, allow the addict to manipulate and convince them they are “okay”, or are so bitter they are unable to display any grace whatsoever. Using a professional interventionist is an excellent alternative. The professional interventionist truly knows and understands the addict as well as the struggling family members. This interventionist can lead and direct specific projects, statements and tasks required by each family member. The interventionist spends time planning for the intervention prior to actually confronting the addict. Pastors and church leaders might be another excellent resource to call upon. A pastor that works in recovery or has been exposed to addicts and alcoholics would be most qualified.

Interventions don’t work if the addict truly isn’t ready to stop using. Some addicts simply don’t want to quit. If this is the case, then it is time that you show the addict “tough love”. This is where you want to enforce boundaries and stop enabling the addict to continue to use in any way. By making the addiction more “painful”, there is a better chance the addict will finally decide to get help. Remember, controlling someone else’s behavior is impossible. The purpose of setting boundaries is merely to protect yourself and your family members, and to let the addict know that you love him or her too much to participate in his or her choice to consume alcohol or use drugs in any way.

I’ve Been Told I Need Help.

Why? Whether or not your addict gets help and enters treatment, you can learn to cope in healthy ways. If you struggle with codependency, you will literally need to unlearn some of the ways you have been functioning in that relationship. Seek counseling, a 12-step program (Al-Anon or Celebrate Recovery) or find guidance from a recovery pastor who understands addiction and codependency. Seek out books and resources. We recommend you visit our codependence blog at www.christiancodependence.wordpress.com.

But most importantly, seek out God. This is the time to “let go and let God”. In your recognition of the enormity of substance addiction and your inability to change it, you have the opportunity to hand it over to God (Step 3). Your prayers are by far your most powerful weapon. As you depend on the Lord, He may change the addict in your life, but He will definitely change you and grant you the peace and joy of His presence.

For more information on addiction, codependency or for help in planning an intervention, please contact us at 714-841-1906.

Stephanie Tucker is the codependency and family counselor of New Life Spirit Recovery

April 18, 2013May 25, 2019

Treating Addiction With Truth

Did you know that according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) that in 2010 “23.1 million people needed treatment for a drug or alcohol problem, and only 2.6 million, or 11.2 percent, received it.”. Another statistic states that 1 in 11 Americans 12 or older are addicted. Addiction is an enormous, enormous problem in our culture and society. Its consequences are greater than we can comprehend. Whatever preconceived notions there have been about the face of a drug addict, we know that today addiction is everywhere and can affect people with all backgrounds. And that means, yes, even people and leaders in the church can be addicted. Families are suffering, companies are affected, the healthcare system is bogged down, jails and prisons are overcrowded and people don’t know what to do with the epidemic. With so much more technology, advanced “scientific” research and more access to help then ever before, why is addiction getting worse, not better?

Treating Addiction with Truth

Defining the root drive of addiction is perhaps the greatest source of division on this topic. The medical community claims the physical brain and other genetic dispositions are the culprit behind addiction. Medical science seems unable to treat addiction except with oftentimes more medication, and thus the transferring of one substance to another. There is no question that the brain gets altered by substance abuse, but the medical community claims the brain is the cause, not just the effect of substance abuse. Ironically, most medical doctors know that the most effective way to treat addiction is through a spiritual remedy of the 12 step process.

Christians also range in their understanding of addiction. Some Christians and churches simply label it as willful sin, thus consider the person struggling with addiction as merely rebellious. They may even look at the addictive nature of a person and resolve that their behavior is explained because “they are not really a Christian in the first place”. Other churches may try to help an addict, but don’t have the understanding of the power of addiction, and the tools that are required to create an atmosphere where addicts can seek help.

Whatever our own perception of addiction is, somewhere lies the actual truth of its roots and cause. How we find ourselves defining addiction will lie in direct correlation to the solution we seek to apply to it. If we see people as merely the effect of a medical disorder, we’ll find security in sending a person through the scientific approach, relying on medication and other approaches. If we believe addiction is just a “sin” issue, we’ll judge and form conclusions about the addict’s spiritual status, and thus be prone to the “throw them out.”

Seeking Truth

As Christians, we’ve been granted the gift of a lifetime – the access to truth. This truth is not just stated in God’s Word, but can be used to interpret the world around us through the mind of Christ. Truth isn’t just a Bible passage, but the ability to take God’s wisdom and apply it to our daily lives, including the reality of addiction.

What Do We Believe?

Our perspective of what constitutes the source of truth will determine the outcome of our lives. If we seek medical digests and human knowledge as truth, that’s where we go to access solutions. And what we will receive is whatever resources the medical community has available, namely medication and mental health specialists who use human theories to treat addiction. If we use the Bible as our source of truth, we will be able to access its resources. We will have the opportunity to see God’s viewpoint of life, relationships, dependencies and sin, and given the power and resources that God’s promises offer.

But learning God’s Word and accessing and applying it to our lives is where the battle will be waged. That’s because oftentimes we are told things in the Bible that contradict what we see with our eyes, and what our modern-day society has deemed as “truth.” In fact, the Bible tells us that we are engaged in a battle for our minds – the very essence of our belief systems. This battle is not happening through flesh and blood people (although it manifests through people and systems), but we are engaged with “forces of darkness.” Now let’s be honest. That is an uncomfortable truth! It’s a truth that we would rather brush under the rug and choose to ignore. Yet, if God’s Word is the source of truth, we cannot deny it’s statement.

How We Receive Truth

Many times truth is distorted because it’s used as a rule book and a measuring stick, rather than a revelation of heart and purposes of God. Thus “truth” that claims to know the Bible and have the answers, but lacks a deep encounter of Jesus Christ, isn’t truth at all. That’s because when Jesus walked this earth, He became “truth” in flesh and blood. Let’s read:

In the beginning the Word already existed.The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through Him, and nothing was created except through Him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and His life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it. – John 1: 1-5 (NLT)

A relationship with Jesus Christ lead us to the source of truth, because it gives us access to Him. When we are spiritual blind and caught in the perils of denial, we in essence are walking in darkness. But when Jesus enters into our life, He gives light, and the ability to see. With addiction, as with all areas of our lives, the person suffering will first need “see truth” before they will have access to God’s solution.

Truth and the Holy Spirit

Sadly, the work of the Holy Spirit gets desperately misunderstood and neglected in the life of many believers. For the addict, it is imperative and absolutely necessary to learn to walk and live in the Spirit. That’s because the Holy Spirit performs functions that oppose our human default patterns. The addict isn’t just doing “bad stuff” on purpose. There is an entire infected system in their life that needs to be re-wired. The mind of the addict is broken and filled with faulty information. Their thoughts have been bound by lies that contradict God’s plans and purposes for their life. Through faulty belief systems, they have formed habitual patterns that led to strongholds. Strongholds are lies that become a truth. They are an automatic response over a period of time, rather than a choice.

Because of this very important component, that’s why a central focus in the treatment or the recovery process must be in the arena of truth. Truth finding is not about a human counselor standing with a bunch of “therapeutic” knowledge and claiming to have the insight to a person’s problem. Rather, truth finding is a process that occurs ONLY when a person is able to engage with the Holy Spirit. To set things straight – the Holy Spirit is a Person and part of the Trinity. The Holy Spirit actually houses the very mind of Christ. This is God Almighty coming inside us and giving us the ability to think, feel and behave under His influence, not our own flesh, in a given situation.

Because the addict has been programmed to think, feel and act based on wrong data, it will take the work of the Holy Spirit to reprogram that data. This will occur gradually as each lie and stronghold is brought to the light and replaced with the truth of God in that situation.

Does it seem radical that only the power of Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit can cure an addict? If so, stop and assess your own ideas of addiction.

Do you recognize that addiction is terrible and can lead to death physically, emotionally and spiritually? Have you resolved that you or the person you love must get help, and that it will require God’s intervention?
Do you recognize that all spiritual ailments come in the forms of lies that take our minds captives and cause us to think, feel and behave in a negative way. Thus, addiction recovery must occur by the renewing of the mind, not merely adjusting outward behaviors or treating addiction as a medical condition?
Do you believe in the power of the Holy Spirit? What role does He play in your life? Has He revealed His truth? Do you limit Him to the Word of the Bible alone, or do you let Him press deeply into your heart and reveal how God’s Word must be activated and made alive in your heart?
Where do you bank the hope for the addict in your life? And what pathway must you take to follow that?

Whatever you respond, the questions can be pondered, but they can also be brought directly to the throne of grace. No person can dictate truth to you. It must be worked out with God. No matter your situation, make today the day you claim to receive truth – allow God to penetrate your heart and trust in Him to initiate the processes necessary to bring you or someone you love our of bondage and into freedom.

Lord God,
I need truth to understand addiction in myself or someone I love. I have tried to figure it out on my own, and it is beyond my grasp. Shine a light before me and show me where to go. Lead me to the answers I need in my own situation. Don’t let me be tricked or deceived. When I am afraid, I ask that reveal with kindness and gentleness the pathways of Your will, and offer me Your hope and the fulfillment of Your promises.
In Jesus Name – Amen

Do you need a treatment program that is committed to the spiritual remedy of the Holy Spirit and renewing of the mind? Call us today! If we can’t help you, we will definitely do everything we can to find someone who can!

February 13, 2013May 23, 2019

Understanding Boundaries

bigstock Wrought Iron Fence Black Meta 258218020

Without healthy boundaries, we will allow things into our life that don’t belong. We will give away things we should not give away. We will enable a person in an addiction. And ultimately, we will lose our sense of values and beliefs. It is vital to learn healthy boundaries. Do you understand how they are working in your life?

by Stephanie Tucker, MDAAC, MMin.

If you are dealing with an addict in your life, learning healthy boundaries is an essential ingredient in coping with that relationship. It is important to understand that a person functioning with addictive behaviors is doing things that are inappropriate and irresponsible. However, that person is in deep need of authentic love and concern. How can you love a person suffering from addiction? By taking a stand against wrong behavior and addiction itself, while at the same time knowing that your loved one’s brokenness can be the beginning of a new life. You can only do this by defining and setting healthy boundaries in your life. This allows you the opportunity to love that person, but hate and refuse the addictive behaviors that cause pain and conflict in your home. It will also allow the addict to feel the ramifications of choices that you are not willing to tolerate. Often, when family members are committed to no longer enabling the addict, the addict will come to the desperate place of wanting or needing help. This is not an easy task. But in order to do this, it’s important to begin to understand what boundaries are all about.

What is a Boundary?

Boundaries are invisible fences around ourselves that protect what we let in and what we give out. Boundaries in essence say “I belong to me” and “you belong to you.” They establish a system of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable in our lives and in the lives of those around us. Rather than merely separate, boundaries PROTECT what we possess and value, including our own life and body. By design, boundaries set the course for mutual respect, consideration, protection and safety in all forms of relationships.

Types of Boundaries

Generally speaking, there are two different types of boundaries: external and internal.

External boundaries exist around homes, yards, personal property, desk space, car space, etc. It is very easy to recognize this type of boundary. They define our property and ownership! For someone to enter into our personal property would be an obvious violation.

Our physical bodies also operate through external boundaries. We have a “space” around us that we generally feel the need to protect. If a stranger gets too close to us, for example, we are naturally inclined to feel somewhat threatened, and will probably take a few steps back to recreate that comfortable space. If we felt we were about to be violated, we would mostly likely try to run.

Internal boundaries are much more difficult to understand because they deal with our inner person: our soul and spirit. All of God’s principles, laws and promises rest on a perfect set of boundaries He has established through His Word. Although we may attempt to justify certain behaviors, in reality, God does not negotiate His boundaries. They are very specific for each and every area of our life. Each one of them is established to protect and love us. It is up to us, utilizing the power of the Holy Spirit, to keep those boundaries. If we compromise the things we understand to be right, we will face the negative consequence. We will hurt our relationship to God.

Emotions are the killer of all our attempts to set and adhere to healthy boundaries. This is because how we feel in a given situation isn’t necessarily what we should do. If our lives are dictated by our emotions rather than our beliefs and convictions, compromise is sure to follow. People who lack emotional boundaries are prone to be manipulated or manipulate others. For example, if you tell a person “no” when they are requesting something from you, they might start to pull the emotional strings that would get you to change your mind. They might try to use guilt, shame or fear to convince you to do what they are requesting. If you heed to those “emotional strings”, you will always break a boundary you have set.

Healthy emotional boundaries protect our heart. They ensure we don’t allow or carelessly give away our hearts and souls to the wrong person who might hurt us. They protect those intimate places in our life where we might be weak and vulnerable. Emotional boundaries also separate our feelings from other people’s feelings. This means another person isn’t responsible for how we feel, nor are we responsible for how another person feels. When we do not have healthy emotional boundaries, we are prone to latch unto people inappropriately, and are unable to separate our emotions from that person. This is the beginning to a downward spiral that will lead to all forms of unhealthy relationship issues.

What Boundaries Do:

They DO set guidelines in advance for us to follow in all areas of life (In the areas of weakness, we need someone to help us keep our pre-established boundaries)
They DO protect the morals and values we place in our life
They DO protect our rights to be treated with dignity and respect in all relationships.
They DO protect us from allowing someone to enter into our lives wrongly or ask us to do things we don’t want to do
They DO protect us from our own emotional instability in a given situation
They DO act as a warning sign when we are about enter places that are dangerous
They DO prescribe a consequence if the boundary is breached

What Boundaries Don’t Do:

Boundaries DON’T change our heart – if we continually break a boundary it’s because of a stronghold in our soul and spirit that needs to be overcome. This is why we can’t follow all God’s laws and “boundaries” perfectly. Sometimes our hearts must change before our behavior changes.

Boundaries CAN’T be imposed as control used to change the outcome of someone else’s behaviors. We must decide what we will or will not allow, but cannot force another person to change by setting boundaries. Our boundaries are set for ourselves, we do not set other people’s boundaries.

Boundaries DON’T protect or encourage negative behavior, only behavior driven by God’s Word, morals, values and the preciousness of who we are in Christ. If a boundary encourages unhealthy behavior, it has no element of love and protection.

God’s Example

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were given a set of boundaries by God. He clearly defined what he would and would not allow in His relationship with them. He also prescribed the consequence upfront so they understood what would happen if the boundaries were violated. Then temptation hit. First, Eve was lured by Satan. He convinced her that she needed something God told her she shouldn’t have. She gave into her emotions rather than heeding to the set boundary. Her husband also broke a boundary by allowing her to convince him that eating the apple was acceptable behavior.

When they broke that boundary and ate the forbidden fruit, the consequences were devastating. God had to impose the consequences, otherwise the boundary itself and His Holiness and authority would be meaningless. But we must remember what happened after that. God forgave that behavior and brought restoration their lives. Through their one act of disobedience the entire human race was cursed. But as they were truly broken and remorseful for their choice, God responded by sending a plan of salvation. God’s goal in setting painful consequences? It is a set up to be able to offer forgiveness, healing and newness of life. And a harsh reminder not to commit that behavior again!

This is the essential nature of God’s boundaries:

He establishes them ahead of time and assigns a consequences if they are broken

He establishes them based on His love and desire to protect us, not merely out of control

He gives us the ability to accomplish them by His power living in the inside of us (therefore they are reasonable to accomplish)

He establishes them on the basis of the truth of His Word

He will allow us to feel the consequences if they are broken

When the consequences hurt, God wants us to repent so He can forgive us and restore us

When it comes to dealing with the addict or alcoholic, using God’s principles for setting healthy boundaries is essential. It is important to determine ahead of time what you will or will not allow, and then assign a consequence for that behavior. Unfounded threats don’t work. “If you do that one more time, I’ll do this”, you might say. But when it all comes down to it, it was merely a threat to change (control) a behavior, not a healthy boundary at all. You have a right to establish boundaries in your home. However you have an obligation to make sure those boundaries are realistic and fair, and founded in love, not control. Most important, you must be willing and ready to follow through on the consequence, otherwise, the ”fence” (boundary) gets trampled and is no longer valid.

Sometimes, boundaries are “tough love.” So often, family members struggle with this. Remember something, IT NOT LOVE TO ALLOW SOMEONE TO CONTINUE IN ADDICTIVE BEHAVIOR. If you in anyway allow or unknowingly encourage that behavior, you are now participating in it. Rather, as God demonstrates for us, it is loving to place a healthy boundary in your life that protects you and those you love, including the addict, from harmful behaviors. The PAIN OF THAT CONSEQUENCE IS MEANT AS A LOVING METHOD OF EXPRESSING THAT CERTAIN BEHAVIORS ARE NOT ACCEPTABLE AND WON’T BE ALLOWED. But the ultimate goal is not the pain of the consequence. It is the brokenness that follows the painful consequence that holds so much POWER. In that broken state, forgiveness is offered and recovery begins.

As you learn to set healthy boundaries in all relationships, you may be surprised how often your decisions are based on emotions or the need to please people rather than on your legitimate right to keep your boundary in place. If you struggle with this, ask Jesus to be your “gatekeeper”. Think of Him as the person that is assigning and protecting the “fences” in your life. Think of Him as the person that will also impose a consequence on any violation. You know He’s doing it in love. You know He takes His boundaries very seriously! And you know His ultimate goal is always restoration and new beginnings.

Learn more about codependence and the process of setting healthy boundaries through The Christian Codependence Recovery Workbook: From Surviving to Significance

January 18, 2013May 25, 2019

The Power to Change

Did you ever find it frustrating that despite your best efforts, change is difficult, and sometimes seemingly impossible to obtain? New Year’s resolutions quickly fall short as our true desires and ideals quickly become another pile of unmet self-expectations. So why do we fail? Is it self-discipline that we lack? If we struggle with addiction, should we have the will power to just stop?

For those of us who have walked the roadway of Christ-centered recovery, we fully recognize that had we been left to our own devices, we would be in a hopeless condition. We understand that apart from God we can do nothing. Yet with His resources and our connection to Him, we’ve been equipped with everything necessary to live this life and be victorious. So what’s stopping us if we aren’t there? And how can we truly unlock the mystery of living out the life we desire? Let’s take a closer look!

Where Change Begins

We often think change begins simply because we have a desire for it, and then we can work hard to attain it. But in truth, we can possess the desire for change in relationships, health, image, career, ministry and other areas without any results, leaving us feeling frustrated and seemingly hopeless. Although our desire to change is certainly necessary, striving, trying, and pushing ourselves is not the solution. God declares in His Word that “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (1 Corinthians 12:9). Change is not a result of our human effort; it’s a result of the power of God coming into our lives through the Holy Spirit. This power isn’t activated by us “trying”, but by us acknowledging that we can’t. The first step in the 12 step program basically states “I can’t manage my own life.” At step three, we move to the place of giving God control. It is clear that all other freedom rests through this transaction. This means that God can only be activated when we:

1. First admit that we are incapable of changing

2. We submit to God to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves.

God’s Job in Changing Us

Imagine for a moment if you had a major crisis with your home, such as a natural disaster, that caused devastating damage to your home. As you sifted through the broken rubble, you recognized that the environment needed to be changed. Your home was no longer able to be inhabited in its current condition. So in the day and weeks to come, a contractor was hired to plan all necessary repairs. Since this was no ordinary damage, you recognized you were totally unable to fix the home without outside intervention and equipment. But despite that reality, now, imagine that you were so deeply overcome by fear that the contractor would bring further damage, you opted to take a seat right next him, and control and mandate how he should do his job. You insisted that he do things in your timing and way. You directed him to work in ways that were unsafe and far from the process that he was equipped to perform. Thus, in the midst of large plans to reconstruct, your “intervention” posed a safety hazard and impeded the work from continuing. So as the contractor stepped aside, you took the tools and tried to fix things yourself. It might be no surprise that it didn’t work. Disaster after disaster occurred. The walls and roof crumbled around you, and you had absolutely no skill or ability to overcome and repair. The house could not be fixed, and you were overwhelmed by your position of responsibility to try to do the impossible.

While that may sound extreme, in many ways we bring God into our situations in a like manner. For a season we may “hire Him” to do the job. We are desperate in the moment and plead for His assistance. Yet once He enters into our lives and exposes the things that are broken and in need of “fixing”, we get nervous. We doubt Him and His capabilities. We fear the loss of control over our future. We fear that things will be changed in ways we won’t like. So rather than trust in the engineering and capability of a God who is PERFECTLY able to be make our lives whole, we snatch the role from Him, and put ourselves in charge. And from there, we begin to find that apart from Him, it is impossible!

Creating the Environment for Change

As we recognize that we can’t change ourselves or stop addictive behavior, it’s important to understand that God operates by certain conditions and terms. For example, just as a general contractor must secure an environment that is safe for his workers to implement the construction plans, so our Lord must be given permission to survey, evaluate and implement His own process. This means we will need to enter into a “contract” with Him on His terms, asking Him to change us, with the commitment to be surrendered to Him and His established purposes in the situation. We must let Him bring His blueprints to fruition without trying to intervene.

It’s helpful to understand the general methods of God’s operation, and to understand where we might struggle in the pursuit of allowing God to change us. Let’s look:

God brings the light of truth. When He first enters into our situation, God will reveal the truth of what is occurring. This requires a willingness to confront our lives and circumstances on the basis of what they are, not how we wished or pretended they would be. Sometimes we can be so focused on the wrongs of someone else, that we have been blinded to our unhealthy behaviors. If we are consumed by denial, He will confront us and expose what has been hidden. Denial is a tricky reality because we usually deny to cope with pain. God knows what has occurred and what has prevented us from seeing things as He sees things. This can be very disruptive at first. It would be like having that disaster strike in the evening hours where everything is covered and naked to the eye. Then, as the sun begins to rise, the level of rubbish can be revealed.

God’s revelation is not to harm us. In fact, He can get to work the moment light is shining and we are willing to participate. If we remain in denial (darkness), God can’t work. That’s because He is light. And where He exists, darkness will leave, and truth will be exposed. Therefore, the moment we try to cover, hide or bury what He reveals, He is prevented.

God operates by love. If we ever see God as angry or after some agenda to hurt us, we’ll never have the confidence to fully give our lives to Him. God is tender-hearted and kind. He is compassionate and filled with mercy and grace. He sees the wreckage in and around us and knows that He alone has the remedy to fix what’s broken. However, just because He is that way towards us doesn’t mean that we will perceive Him in that manner. If we harbor a faulty idea of God because of our earthly experience, we will not engage with God properly. Instead of the Contractor of our Soul that can restore us, we’ll be prone to try to get Him to work within our own “blue print” of how we think He should “love” us. Furthermore, if we have a fear-based understanding of God, we by default will protect ourselves from Him rather than invite Him inside.

God operates by holiness.While God is loving, He has a radical agenda in our lives that will not negotiate, approve, or be even remotely tolerant of the sin that hurts us so deeply. Yet He is not oriented towards changing the outwards and giving us a set of lists that we are expected to live up to. Many of us mistook holiness as law-based expectations. In truth, God’s holy nature means He desires to remove the darkness, brokenness and sin issues that plague us, knowing full well the damage they cause. God’s holiness also means He wants us to be restored back to the original design and purpose He has for us. And the only thing that prevents us from that are the areas where sin, shame and brokenness still exist. God acts as a Surgeon to eradicate the cancer in us to preserve our life. He uses the power of forgiveness and grace to remove those things that hold us back. Sometimes this process can be painful. We must not grow weary in the process or misunderstand His purposes. God’s relentless pursuit of our holiness was the entire purpose of Jesus Christ. Through Him we can be cleansed, purified and made holy.

God uses grace to change us. Just as holiness is God’s agenda, we can rest assured that the responsibility of its attainment does not rest in our own resources. Instead, God gave us grace. Grace refers to God’s unmerited favor, but it can also be thought of as everything we need to live life. This includes all the resources and healing abilities of God. Grace first seeks to remove our sin and residue of shame from our hearts. Then, it seeks to teach us to deal with the shame that others impose upon us. Grace is a like a cleansing agent that purifies and restores everything it touches, and re-aligns everything is broken. If we could access it in its entirety, it would set everything back on course.And so now we come back to our initial point. Grace is activated in our weakness. In other words, when we have a pile of rubbish around us, and we are screaming “I can’t Lord, help me” – grace has the environment to work. But at the same when we come geared up with our own tools and agenda, grace is prohibited.

God operates through faith and praise, not fear and worry.No matter how desperately we need to be changed, if we approach God with the general belief that He can’t help us and that our problems are too big for Him, He won’t even be able to enter into that situation. It may take everything in us to simply say, “Lord, I struggle, help me believe! I believe that you can! I believe that you are able!” Sometimes our inner conversation sounds more like “I know you can’t. I don’t even think you want to help me.” This deeply grieves the Spirit of God. Even though He loves us and wants to free us, we are speaking things that oppose His truth. Thus, God will stay away until He is invited in on the basis of who He actually is.

Do you have power in your life to change? First of all, have you met Jesus Christ? That is the beginning of all true change. If you’ve invited Him into your heart, has He been given access to do the work of transformation? Ask Him to bring you deeper into understanding how you need to be healed, where you are broken and the plan He has to redeem you. God is faithful!

Do you want to participate in a healing workshop? The Christian Codependence Workshops are sponsored by Spirit of Life Recovery and taught by Stephanie Tucker, author of The Christian Codependence Recovery Workshop: From Surviving to Significance. It’s a step by step process of allowing God to engage and restore the things that are broken by relying Him and believing in the power of grace! Click here to learn more. This is applicable for every single Christian despite the struggle.

Do you want to help others find deliverance? Get trained on how to use this process to lead groups or assist people in the counseling room. Click here to learn more.

September 11, 2012May 25, 2019

My Family Member is in Treatment, Now What?

by Stephanie Tucker, MDAAC, MMin.

Dealing with a family member’s addiction has most likely been a painful rollercoaster. You’ve reached the bottom at times, and didn’t know how you would be able to continue another day. Watching someone you love destroy his or her life through addiction can be an emotionally exhausting and extraordinarily stressful experience.

So if your family member has finally sought help, why do you continue to feel anxious and stressed out? Why is it that as they are seeking help, you are finding it hard to cope?

Here’s a practical strategy to help ground you as you deal with difficult emotions.

Give Grace

The bible says that “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” (James 4:6) We can use the same approach in dealing with an addict in our family. If he or she is truly broken and remorseful, now is the time to give grace. This means it is not appropriate to bring up everything wrong that was taking place during the addiction. It is not the time to share your anger or frustration that has been pent up inside you (although you most certainly need to share that with a trusted friend or sponsor). At one point, those issues will need to be addressed, but for now, the addict in your life needs grace.

How do you do this? Be willing to see past an addict’s behavior and know that underneath is a human being in need of God’s healing and forgiveness. God isn’t going to deal with the addict in your life by pointing out all of his or her sinful external behaviors (even though the behaviors are wrong). God wants to find the true person locked underneath the addiction, and reveal to him or her what went wrong that led to this path of destruction in the first place. If the addict in your life is humble and broken, this will be an amazing process ignited by God’s grace. If the addict is not ready for this process and continues to engage in self-centered, rebellious behavior, the process of recovery will not work. Why? Because the “process” is confession, repentance and renouncing of sin. This could never work if one is not willing. If this happens, prepare yourself to set firm, strict boundaries that will no longer tolerate or permit the behavior surrounding addiction in your life.

Be Understanding and Educated about Addiction

Unfortunately, many people truly don’t understand addictive behavior, even people who truly do mean well. They see an addict’s behavior as personal weakness or willful rebellion. However, when in full swing, addiction is no longer a conscious choice, but something the bible calls a stronghold. (although at one point a choice was made that brought the addict to this point.) In the addiction cycle, the physical body is addicted, but the true cause is rooted in spiritual and emotional damage. These roots must be dealt with properly in order for true change to occur. The most important step in recovery is a full admission that one is powerless over addiction, BUT that God is more powerful. A true surrender to God through Jesus Christ brings all the power necessary to overcome addiction. This surrender doesn’t account for the transformation (sanctification) process that happens more gradually. An addict needs to learn how to live life again, change one day at time, and receive lots of support from others going through the same thing.

Set Realistic Relationship Expectations

Relationships take time to heal. An addict in recovery needs time to focus on self. Many times, family members feel this process is “selfish”, and feel angry or hurt that they are being left out. Understand, addiction truly affects and infects the entire family system. At New Life Spirit Recovery, the addict will spend much time learning about proper relationship skills and God’s plan for the family. However, focusing on relationships cannot happen until the addict in your life has addressed his or her personal issues, including the root causes for the addictive behavior. Don’t pressure your family member to become the spouse, child, mother, father or friend that you have wanted and need. Rather, patiently wait for that healing process to take root and spend much time in prayer, relying on God to change that person. Understand, it may take some time before the relational issues can be fully addressed. If true recovery occurs, this will happen.

Set Boundaries

While you will be required to forgive the addict in your life, you do not need to allow that behavior again in the future. Whether you are a spouse, parent, friend or church leader, this is the time to set boundaries that you can stick with. As a spouse or parent, you may want to clearly stake out those things you will not allow, and set specific consequences.

When working on developing boundaries, seek help from a wise person or sponsor who understands true recovery. Remember, it gets tricky at times, because as much as boundaries are necessary, there are times when grace is warranted. Knowing the difference can be difficult if you are learning to set healthy boundaries for the first time. Your loved one will also be learning in treatment how to set healthy boundaries. That means this is an excellent opportunity for both of you to mutually set loving boundaries and agree to have a mutual plan for accountability, expectations and consequences.

Prepare for Transition

If the addict in your life truly does begin a transformation process, prepare yourself for a major transition in the family/relationship. You may have grown accustomed for overly caring for that person. In some ways, you may experience a sense of loss in the relationship. All the things you have been doing for that person will suddenly be unnecessary. As strange as it may be, when we have dysfunctional relationships due to addiction, everyone can adapt so much that when the addict gets better, the other family members don’t know how to readjust. Prepare for some transition difficulties. You may not feel comfortable with your husband’s desire to lead the family again. You may not feel comfortable that your adult child wants to be entirely independent. But in reality, these are GOOD! Still, it’s entirely possible and even probable that this transition may be emotionally uncomfortable for you. If you are doing your part through educating yourself about addiction and codependency and participating in support groups, you and the addict in your life stand an excellent chance of coming through this with a healthy and whole relationship. It takes two people willing to address their personal contribution to the problem to allow the relationship to heal. If you feel especially challenged in this area, you may want to consider finding a counselor who has a biblical understanding of addiction to help you.

Learn to Refocus

Oftentimes, it can be as difficult to be the person supporting an addict in treatment as the person actually going through treatment. The addict in treatment is surrounded by supportive people who understand where he or she has been. You, on the other hand, may feel entirely alone. What should you do? The hardest part is for you to truly let go. Resolve to take the focus off the addict, (you can of course continue to pray) and take time to understand what is going on inside you. What are you feeling? Are you angry or hurt? Have you lost your identity while focusing too much on the addict and not enough on yourself? Use this time to connect to God and ask for His wisdom and strength. Ask yourself how you may have contributed to the negative relationship symptoms. Most family members have some form of codependency. Ironically, these issues can contribute to the problem so much, that if they are not addressed, they will prevent a proper healing to take place in the relationship. If you would like more information on codependency, you can contact one of our counselors. You can also find a local 12-step meeting such as Celebrate Recovery, Al-Anon or Codependency Anonymous. This will bring you the much needed support to get through this time and the transition of recovery.

Stephanie Tucker is the Codependency and Family Counselor at New Life Spirit Recovery

July 16, 2012May 25, 2019

Do You Know What It Means to Be Free?

By Stephanie Tucker

What does it mean to be free on the inside? For some of us, it might seem a strange question. For others, we might understand where we found that freedom. Freedom on the inside occurs when as humans we realize that we fall short and need the resources from God to make our life work. It isn’t just a matter of professing our faith in Jesus Christ, it entails an entire systemic change where we surrender and give God access to every aspect of our life. It means that we are not bound to anything or anyone that would control or prevent us from being all that God intended us to be. When we are free, we are in alignment with our Creator – all thing fall under His authority in our life. When we are not free, however, another force dominates us. We become entangled in things that take us away from God’s true purpose and plan for us.

The Rule of Freedom versus Domination

To put in perspective, think of freedom in terms of nations. The United States of America is founded above all on freedom. It protects and gives right to individuals, allowing them to make choices within the confines of the laws. This allows people to pursue their interests, to worship in their own churches, to choose their own career and to express their individuality in a variety of ways. These choices may or may not align with God’s truth, but the purpose of freedom is in choice.

On the other hand, nations under dictatorship rule impose standards on their citizens. People living under the authority of that power axle may be told how to dress, who to worship, what to speak, what to read or what property to own. In this environment, individual freedoms are lost, and thus the people are not able to live and express their own choices. That means the people of that nation are enslaved.

The very notion of freedom isn’t political; it’s a system God put in place when He created mankind. God gave Adam and Eve the gift of freedom – this means He didn’t create them to be mere robots that were forced to do His will. With that freedom came choice and responsibility. Why would God do such a thing when He could have prevented them from sinning in the first place? If God took personal freedom away, He would have been a mere dictator, forcing people and controlling people through domination, not because of the freedom in their hearts. Being in that position would violate the heart of God – which above all else chooses to respect the human race and enter into relationship with His children on the basis of love.

In our own lives, the struggle to keep our hearts in the position of freedom is always at play. For those of us in recovery, we may have encountered a power that overtook us, such as drugs and alcohol, which removed our ability to make choices. Under its influence, we became bound to compulsively need more, thus we became completely enslaved.

But the loss of freedom comes in many others way, some much more subtle and difficult to recognize. This means we don’t just need to be under the influence of a drug or other form of addiction to be in bondage.

Ways We Aren’t Free

We can be bound in our hearts in a variety of ways. Sometimes, people with addictions get the help they need because their addictions are obvious. But we can be suffering from a loss of freedom inside of our hearts and not even be aware. Here are some examples:

We have a religious mind-set rather than a grace-based mindset – Whenever we begin to live the Christian life based on an external check-list of what we do or don’t do, we are in some form of bondage. Some of the most important freedom we find as Christians is freedom from sin’s condemnation. We realize that God’s gift of freedom and forgiveness is something we can’t purchase. That means there isn’t something we can do or not do to take it away.

For those of us that may not have come into contact yet with the depths of the love of God, we may be accustomed to “working for God” or trying to “win over” His approval or the approval of others. This form of “buying” love or approval stands in direct opposition to the free nature of God’s gifts, gifts He offers us through His grace. Anyone who has this mentality in their life needs a richer, more personal understanding of this grace.

We hold someone else responsible for our feelings or actions – Whenever we find ourselves holding a human being in the position of being in charge of why we feel or act a certain way, we have empowered that person. In essence, they have a form of “ownership” of our life, whether or not they asked for it. That’s not to say we can’t be influenced by people, but when there is a direct string that attaches us to another person in such a way that we find it difficult to understand we begin and they end, we are in a form of bondage. This is also a symptom of codependency.

When we attempt to control another person – Whether outward and obvious, or subtle and manipulative, when we are engaged in relationships where we are trying to dominate how another person thinks, feels or acts, we’ve taken a position of control that contradicts God’s principles. This can be rather difficult to see, especially if we tend to believe we are truly benefitting the people in our lives who we wish to control, such as an adult child or spouse.

Sometimes, our efforts to control others are methods to manage and deal with our fears and insecurities. We begin to think that if we can control the people in our life, we’ll be able to feel stable. However, this rarely occurs. Trying to control another person only makes matters worse.

Other times, we may have learned to use control as a form of power over others, thus use it to get what we need or desire in relationships. This mindset is similar to a dictator – and clearly is a form of bondage that needs to be dealt with.

We allow our emotions to dictate our reality – For anyone who has struggled with depression or serious anxiety, those symptoms are real. For those who deal with anger and rage, those symptoms are also real. But where we have an emotional issue in our life that is paralyzing us to the point that we can’t overcome it in a healthy way, our hearts are not free. Emotions are indicators of deeper underlining issues. When we can find those root issues and deal with them according to God’s provisions in our lives, the emotional issues might not completely end initially, but we won’t feel as though they have to overpower all aspects of our lives. If we emotional issues that feel out of control, it’s an indication that need to deal with something significant.

We are self-sufficient – In a culture that encourages self-sufficiency and independence, it’s difficult to recognize that it is actually a form of bondage rather than freedom. Our chronic need to manage our own life, fix our own problems and meet our own needs removes the ability of God to provide in our lives. It causes us to depend on ourselves rather than Him, thus leaves us exhausted and unable to overcome the trials of life.

What to Do If My Heart Isn’t Free

If you recognize areas where you don’t have freedom, it simply means that there is a life awaiting you that will allow you to become who God intended you become if you will surrender and trust Him. God doesn’t just come to bring us abundance in the material sense; He comes to bring abundance to our souls – to restore us and position us for the life He designed for us to live. This abundance produces in us His resources – love, peace, grace, kindness, patience, compassion. It doesn’t take away the challenges of life, however, it just gives us a better way to deal with them.

So how can you get free? It’s important to know that it’s not your own efforts that will get you on track. As we begin to understand that we have bondage in our life, we must also understand that the Only One who can deliver us is our Lord Jesus. It’s easy to profess Jesus Christ with our lips, but we also must give Him access into our hearts. This requires that we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, honest and authentic before Him.

Many times we stay in our bondage and adapt our lives around it. While we may not be free, we are scared of what the cost might be if we truly surrendered fully to God. Therefore, we keep hanging on, missing out on God’s authentic purpose for us. In order to move into freedom, we must first understand that God does not force us into relationship with Him, and therefore, will only go to the places where we grant Him permission.

Giving God Access:

The only cure for a lack of freedom in our hearts is through an invitation to our Lord Jesus. We must:

Acknowledge/face the areas of my life where I’m in bondage and bringing it openly before the Lord.
Confess and ask for His forgiveness and grace to cover me
Allow (give permission) to God, through the Holy Spirit, to get into the deep areas of my heart so He can reveal the roots that have driven me into bondage. This may take time, and it may be painful at times.
Continually denounce the things that I hold onto that replace the provisions of God – and continually announce the authority of God to manage my life on my behalf

Prayer of Deliverance

Father God,

I acknowledge that I’ve allowed things into my life that have placed me in bondage. I chose these things to survive, to feel good or to independently manage my life apart from you. I realize that I have been caught in a trap. I can’t get out of it on my own. I don’t even have the capability to understand or know what is happening in my heart. Lord, today, I release these things over to you and surrender my heart and my life to you. I pray that you would take me out of the trap I climbed into. I give you permission to get on the inside of me and reveal and deal with those things in my life that led me into bondage. I pray to renounce each and every sin, relationship or mentality that stands in contradiction to your truth. I announce that I am a precious child of God, free in Your truth and free to become who you created me to become. Father, I need your grace because I know that I won’t be zapped overnight. Lead me to the right recovery community or support system so that I can learn to walk out that freedom from here on out.

In Jesus Name,

A-men

June 18, 2012May 25, 2019

What’s My Role in Addiction? Families Dealing with the Cycle of Addiction

by Stephanie Tucker, MDAAC, M.Min

Over and over again family members come to us confused, angry and overcome by a sense of hopelessness and fear that their loved one’s addiction is out of control, and may even lead to death. They have grown weary of trying to help the addict in their life, and don’t know where to turn. Perhaps you can relate to their pain. The question is what, if anything, can you really do to help a person in an addiction? Do you have a part in your loved one’s recovery? The answer may not be the one you’ve been seeking, but it is still an emphatic YES!

Confronting Your Role: Have I become an Enabler?

No matter how frustrated you might have become by your loved one’s addiction, it is important to understand how you may be unknowingly participating in the addiction cycle. Trying to help an addict is a difficult and often impossible task. While most family and friends truly mean well, they sometimes end up falling in the trap of becoming an enabler. If you are covering up, excusing or overly trying to fix the addict in your life, there is a good chance you fall in this category. Enablers have good intentions, but as the addiction cycle progresses, they become as much a part of the problem as the addiction itself. Here are some key ingredients of understanding if you are showing the signs of enablement:

Feeling as though your “help” will get the addict out of his or her addiction.
Doing for the addict what he or she can and should be doing for himself or herself.
Continually providing money, housing and other things to “make up” for what the addict isn’t handling well. Being overly responsible to compensate for the addict’s irresponsible behavior.
Telling “white lies” or covering up negative behavior in order to rescue the addict from consequences. This could include calling in “sick” to a boss or helping the addict avoid legal ramifications.

Help! What should I do now?

If you recognize any of these behaviors, you need to get to help. The key lesson is for you to learn to establish boundaries. You must be willing to allow the addict in your life to feel the consequences of his or her behavior so he or she may be driven to want help. It is important that you understand that addiction is a manifestation of deeper emotional and spiritual problems. The addict needs to address the underlying roots that have lead up to this behavior. To simply tell an addict to “stop” won’t work. Instead, you must hold the addict accountable for his or her responsibilities, obligations and roles. It is true that the addict is not able to function, but this very behavior must be confronted as unacceptable. Facing consequences for behavior is the key for each and every person in addictive behavior. It is in these consequences that the pain and loss may become so great, the addict will finally seek help. How do you do this? You must decide beforehand what you will NOT allow, and propose a consequence if your loved one chooses to disrespect this. When that boundary is broken, you must be willing to allow the addict to feel and bear the burden of responsibility for his or her action. This may mean losing a job, losing money, losing a place to live or having to face jail time. This is not meant to be easy, that is why it is called “tough love.” Remember, this battle is for life and death.

Is that Really Love?

God’s love is unique, and provides guidelines in all our relationships. The thing we must realize about God’s love is that it operates in TRUTH and HOLINESS. God does not allow us to continue in our sin and bad choices without feeling the consequences. He lets us hurt, ONLY so that we will run to Him and allow Him alone to fix what is not working. We need to understand that when we allow a person to continue in his or her destructive behavior without allowing consequences, we are hurting him or her deeply. In fact, this is not love at all, but a term that we refer to as codependence. But just as God gives consequences for bad behavior, He does so for the motive of grace and forgiveness. He doesn’t WANT an addict to continue down a path of destruction. He hopes that eventually when the pain is so severe, He’ll be able to snatch an addict from Satan’s grip. We must link boundaries and allowing painful consequences with the true purpose: to give the addict the opportunity to experience God’s grace and mercy. Ultimately, God separates our behaviors from who we really are. God doesn’t always approve of what we do, but He ALWAYS approves our core being because we are stamped, sealed and claimed as His very own child! Remember, you never have to like or approve a behavior, but you can love a person no matter what.

A Time to Surrender

Addiction is a horrible stronghold. In full swing, an addict no longer is making a rationale choice, but is in complete bondage. By understanding this, you can stop trying to control, fix and change that person. You need to give that person over to God to allow His power to work in that person alone. It is amazing that when we make this transaction, we will experience a tremendous sense of freedom and peace, understanding God is bigger than addiction (and our own efforts!).

Oftentimes, people who have become enablers have issues in their own lives that need to be addressed. Do not be afraid to learn more about codependence and seek help. This may be a tremendous opportunity for your own personal growth!

Practical Applications:

Decide to love the person in your life struggling with an addiction, but hate and stand against his or her addictive behaviors. Realize you are at war with an addiction, but the person underneath truly needs help and love.
Surrender this person over to God. It is His power alone that can set a person free. Spend more time praying and less time trying to fix the situation. Understand that you may be getting in the way of God’s way of dealing with him or her.
Decide right now what you will NOT allow as a result of your loved one’s addiction. Determine consequences if the addict violates this. This may simply mean that you no longer intervene or try to save him or her, or you no longer will provide financial support.
Get help and support for yourself. You too deserve and need the tools to find a peaceful and fulfilling life no matter what the addict in your life chooses to do. Join an Al-Anon or Celebrate Recovery group, or find a trusted friend who understands addiction and what you are going through.

Stephanie Tucker is the Codependency and Family Counselor at New Life Spirit Recovery

November 18, 2011May 23, 2019

Embracing Identity

by Stephanie Tucker, CS, MDAAC, M.Min.

Codependency takes on many forms and symptoms. (To learn about the symptoms of codependency, click here) One of the most challenging areas lies in self-identity. Most people who struggle with codependency have a difficult time seeing themselves from a healthy perspective.
They are often prone to overly focus on the needs of others, while unknowingly disconnecting to self. Instead of being free to live the life that God intended, they get worn down, burdened, guilt-ridden and overwhelmed by a sense of responsibility. Life becomes a constant race to try to accommodate and meet the demands of other people and circumstances. Song of Solomon 1:6 describes a young lady suffering from this very condition. She says “They made me caretaker of the vineyards, But I have not taken care of my own vineyard.” It is truly a sad situation when in our efforts to seemingly help others, we are unable to care for ourselves and even lose ourselves. If this describes you, take some time right now to pray and ask God to begin to work a process in you that will connect you back to who you are. While this article is intended to provide some guidance, it is truly only the Guidance of the Holy Spirit that can bring you through the journey of embracing true identity.

What Is Identity?

Some of us may not have ever really understood the question “who am I?” our entire life. We may have assumed we would figure it out as we went along – as we found the right job, the right spouse, the right life. Yet true identity isn’t any of those things. True identity isn’t found by merely looking at the tasks or good deeds we’ve performed. It isn’t found through our professional credentials, church position, education or personal success. It isn’t even found by the roles we play day to day, such as a mother, wife, father, husband, etc. In fact, identity isn’t about what we do, it is about who we are at our core level.

We can only find true identity by going to the Person that claims ownership of us. It is through our Creator that we find the significance and value of who we truly are. If you own a piece of equipment, what do you reference to understand how it works? You read the owner’s manual, written by the manufacturer. God is our manufacturer, and His Word is our owners manual. He know exactly where we are today, and can see those things that aren’t working quite right. What an amazing perspective this brings to life! God is fully in control of who we are and desires that we see ourselves through His eyes, not our own ideas and belief that are not based on biblical facts. That means we don’t overly estimate or underestimate who we are, we simply accept we are product of His very own hand and His very own heart. His ultimate goal is that we be transformed into the image of His Son, Jesus Christ. This is the true identity and purpose of our life! This translates into hundreds of precious and marvelous promises and truths found in His Word.

When Things Get Broken

Because we live in a fallen world and in fallen flesh, things get broken along the way in our life. We can easily become entangled in sinful hang-ups without even realizing it. We become overwhelmed by difficult relationships and our efforts to change and fix others. Before we know it, life itself isn’t working. No matter how hard we try, we can’t get the results we are looking for. Our routines and patterns we adjusted to simply to “survive” quickly become habits and strongholds. They eventually lead to a variety of character defects. If these character defects overwhelm our life, they can be misconstrued as our identity, or essentially, define who we are. But this inaccurate. We are NOT defined by our defects.

The most significant principle to grasp in this journey is that separation must take place between the person God made you to be, and the sin nature and devastation sin has caused in your life. Sadly, many well-meaning churches and Christians never learn to differentiate between the two. Never mistake a confident, grounded, joyful person who has learned to walk in the freedom of God’s grace as someone prideful. God intended us to be free and experience Him in abundance. He paid a price for our sin and our sin nature. And it is only when we recognize that, surrender to Him and receive His Spirit that we are restored back to the person we were meant to be. Piece by piece, one step at a time, God will remove the tarnish in our life. Just the same, if we never acknowledge sin or the need to be made right, we’ll never become the person God intended us to be.

Leaving the Baggage Behind
If it sounds easy, what holds us back from living in light of this reality? There are two vital ingredients in finding and being established in true identity: removing the faulty belief systems and “baggage” we’ve carried and replacing those lies with the Truth of God’s Word. In order to begin to uncover those things that are blocking and preventing us from living out the life God intended for us, we must be fully surrendered to the biblical process of change. This means we must have a willingness to allow God to “gut out” the lies we have believed, the sinful mentalities we carry and the bitterness we may be harbouring towards others. Recovery is all about removing and ridding the damaging effects of sin (our sin and other people’s sin against us.). The 12 Step program is a direct tool to work through this, but we are going to look at a brief overview we use in our treatment program.

The Process of Securing Identity

The process of recovery (sanctification, transformation) automatically ushers in a solid sense of identity. Therefore, as we make genuine recovery a goal, we find that our identity becomes more and more in line with what God intended. Here are some core functions of that process:

Stop running, cease striving
A codependent by nature has a difficult time admitting and coming to terms with sin and wrongdoing (or might be overly sensitive to it). We might be hiding behind “good” efforts to run away from the shame we feel inside. Instead of hiding, God wants us to confront reality. He isn’t interested in our efforts to impress Him through our deeds. Going to church, reading the bible and helping others mean very little unless we are truly connected to the Lord through a humble, open and honest relationship. He’s interested in our humility and willingness to say “this is wrong with me, this is how I’ve sinned, please forgive me”.

Stop Doing
As we surrender to God’s grace, we will find that He begins to clearly separate what we do from who we are. If we are bound by our personal efforts to please other people, or need to “feel good” through “good behaviors”, God will make us painfully aware that He is not interested in this mindset at all. The only thing God is after is the “real you” that no-one else on this earth can replace. Everything else – sins, habits and hang-ups, need to be removed. It is not in our trying and doing, but in our true surrender that God has His way in our life.

See Reality
If we stay focused on the recovery process, God will begin to show us at deeper levels the beliefs and roots that have been driving our behavior, whether it’s insane efforts to fix, sustain and please others, or chemical addictive behavior. God wants to break through at the very places of our pain – He will uncover the reasons why we do the things we do. It might be a difficult childhood, abuse issues or some other traumatic event. Only your heavenly Father truly knows and understands where you are today. No human being could ever see or understand you like He does. We must be willing to see behind the surface of our outward behavior for God to show us what lies deep in our hearts that needs to be healed.

Seek forgiveness.
God may bring us through a season of pain if we begin to connect to emotions and realities that have been hidden and repressed. His ultimate goal in this process is quite simply forgiveness. But before forgiveness can be applied as the remedy, we must understand and diagnose the problem. That’s why we go through a process first if we’ve been in some form of denial. As God exposes the damage and sin in us, we ask for and receive God’s forgiveness by repenting of our sins. Just the same, we need to be ready to GIVE forgiveness to others. Forgiveness is something we can easily say with our mouth, but having it in our hearts is altogether different. God forgives and loves PEOPLE, not BEHAVIORS. He expects the same of us. We can forgive people, but we need never forgive certain acts. If you struggle with forgiving others, it’s essential that you evaluate and understand how God has forgiven you. “Forgiven” people are “forgiving” people.

Receive Truth. What we believe is ultimately what we become. While God has given us truth, we can choose to whether or not to believe it. The process of restoration happens only as we truly embrace Truth into our life. In this process, we may be astonished to discover the types of lies we have believed. The only way we can encounter Truth and dispel lies is by diligently praying and seeking out a personal relationship with our Lord. We must read His Word while allowing the Spirit of God to apply it specifically to our lives. (Refer again to the chart “Who I Am in Christ)

The most remarkable part of the journey of recovery is getting rid of the damage and the curse of sin in order to receive God’s blessings and fullness in our life. As we’ve learned, our purpose and identity as a child of God was damaged along the way. Through God’s Son, Jesus Christ, we are reconnected to our original purpose. Through Him, we are being restored each and every day.

Remember, when the attacks to your identity come from other people and from your own thought life, you must fight back with the truth of who GOD SAYS YOU ARE. As you begin to approach the challenges and circumstances in your life, having this perspective brings all power necessary through Christ. God will show you where you are overly focused on other people, and will show you how to appropriately love and give to others in your life. You may always be a kind, caring person sensitive to others, but you will learn how to be that way with healthy boundaries. You may always function in a role of helping others, but you will be motivated by the right reason. You will do so in the power of the Holy Spirit. God will use all the things that ever happened in your past for your good and His glory. As you mature, you will be able to truly see and understand the needs of those around you in order to minister to them as you are directed by the Spirit of God.

Do you know who you are today? Do you know to whom you belong? Seek after Him! Embrace all He intended for your life. He says in Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plan I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

If you are not sure you have established a personal relationship with God through His Son, Jesus Christ, please learn more about that today.
It’s the ONLY way you could ever find your true purpose and identity.

Stephanie Tucker is the codependency and family counselor of New LIfe Spirit Recovery

November 11, 2011May 25, 2019

The 12 Steps From A Biblical Perspective Series: Steps 4 & 5: Get Ready for Change

by Robert T. Tucker, PhD

Need to search your heart? Are you getting ready to do a “searching and fearless moral inventory?” Who is capable of helping you look deep within your inner most self? Who knows your heart better than you? If you want to know what’s going on inside you, why not ask your Maker? God knows your strengths, your weaknesses, and every detail about you. He even knows the exact number of hairs on our head. When it comes to your heart and mind, God is the only One capable of revealing the problems, and presenting the solutions. Without Him, there is no recovery. As a matter of Biblical fact, Jesus is the solution to all our problems. Psychology can, at times, analyze problems, but it can’t fix (heal) them. Only God has the power to heal.

Before we begin to understand the purpose of Steps 4 and 5, let’s review the first 3 steps:

Step 1 was the realization that we were defeated and powerless over drugs and alcohol. It is a step of “coming out of denial.

Step 2 is the step of hope. Seeing we have a problem means nothing if we don’t believe we can find a solution to our problem.

Step 3 is a surrender of our will to God’s through a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Once we’ve received Jesus Christ, we have all the tools necessary to continue through the process of biblical change. We are going to learn that steps 4 and 5 are critical in the “cleaning up” process of our life. This deals with our habitual sins and patterns, AND the deeper issues that drive these behaviors. We need to understand:

The exact nature of the things we’ve done wrong to self, to God and to others
The reasons why we do what we do (cause and effect)

A person can become a Christian, and even become sober, but if he or she never faces his or her issues, he or she will still experience internal conflict at a variety of levels. Anyone who has been a Christian for a longer period of time understands that simply accepting Jesus doesn’t instantly bring us the changes we desire. It is a process of change that happens over time through spiritual maturity. These steps are merely a “road map.” When empowered by the Holy Spirit, these steps guide us through the process of biblical transformation.

The Requirements

What is required in this process? There are simple ingredients: honesty, willingness and openness. On page 58 in the Big Book, it is written, “Rarely have we seen someone fail who has thoroughly followed these steps. Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women that are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. It is clearly written that; if we follow the suggestions of those that have successfully pioneered before us, we will recover.

The Purpose of Step 4 and Step 5.

Step 4 is the reality check step. It is only when we have received Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior that we have power to perform this step. Prior to that, we were blinded by our sinful desires and lusts. Without a surrender to our Lord, we were without power. Now, we are capable of seeing the reality of our behaviors as well as others, and we are able to do something about them. As we look at this step, we must remember some important truths.

God loves the sinner, not the sin. He will never look at sinful behavior and approve of it. The behavior is just plain unacceptable in His eyes. He paid a hefty price for the forgiveness of it, and His position on this will never change.
God wants to forgive us. The purpose of exposing bad behaviors is to seek His forgiveness, not to experience shame. God desires that we repent so that He can wash us clean. We are sin stained rags, cleansed by His blood and presented to God as white as snow.
God wants to show us the roots behind our sin. We are actually living in the effects of another’s behaviors. God knows the summation of our life experiences and desires to clean us up and set us free at root levels.
God loves us unconditionally. There is nothing we can do past or present that will change His love for us.
God is asking us to face this step with Him, hand-in-hand, in order to experience a deeper level of His freedom. Choosing to do so allows us to become the person He created us to be as He proceeds to remove the various layers of dysfunction in our life.

Step 4: “Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

Why an Inventory?

As simplistic as it may sound, no one seeks solution for a problem they don’t believe exists. Step 4 and 5 are all about seeing things as they really are, not how we pretend them to be, and then properly dealing with them. Both steps require honesty and humility. Different sponsors utilize different approaches when it comes to the steps. In any case, the key ingredient necessary in experiencing a full healing is forgiveness.

Doing a “searching and fearless moral inventory” requires a fear remover. There is only One! The Bible tells us that God is love and that “perfect love casts out ALL fear“. So literally, a Fear-less search is a God-full search. The objective of these steps cannot be properly accomplished without Him. He not only helps with the search, but exposes, discloses, disposes and heals the wounds these behaviors have caused.

Step 5: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

In step five, three very important things take place.

We admit (confess) to God – to receive His forgiveness. (1 John 1:9) “But if we confess our sins to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.”
We admit (confess) to our self, coming out of denial – and acknowledging the facts.
We admit (confess) to another person for healing (James 5:16) “confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed”

In order to guide and direct you in this process, we suggest that you take the following steps:

1. Find a sponsor or spiritual mentor, a brother or sister who is spiritually mature and godly – not one just “sitting “in a 12 step meeting. A good candidate would be one truly exhibiting the characteristics of Jesus. Remember, a wrong choice may be costly A sponsor/mentor should never try to replace the influence of the Spirit of God.

2. Properly work through the first three steps, accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior. Then, and only then are you equipped to proceed to step four.

3. Begin by writing your life story from childhood to current. Focus on the things that have hurt you or traumatized you; abandonment, disappointments, heartaches, unmet expectations, fears and any form of abuse. Include decisions you made that were wrong, and specific ways you felt you were violated.

4. Based on your story, focus in on specific people and situations that are painful. Write detailed lists expressing your thoughts, feelings and actions in those situations. For example, if a parent was verbally abusive, explain how you dealt with it. What were you thinking and feeling in that situation? How did you respond?

5. Write a list of the ways you have caused harm or injury to others. Include sexual sins if applicable. If it’s helpful, keep scripture close by that reminds you of God’s faithfulness. The enemy is prone to attack as you face self. God wants us to face these things so He can offer His forgiveness.

6. Write a list of how you have hurt yourself through your actions. Include sexual sins if applicable (sexual sins hurt us the most because they are sins against our body).

7. Write a list of the people who have hurt you in ways you don’t feel you deserve. As you begin to feel sad or overcome by anger, review your list of the things you have done wrong.

8. Realize that you can only be set free from sin through the blood of Jesus. You alone are powerless to stop sinning.

9. Realize that the people who have sinned against you have the same condition as you. While you don’t need to forgive their behaviors (especially since you can’t anyway – only God can forgive sin), in the name of Jesus, choose to forgive the people.

10. Prepare to share your list with God and your sponsor/mentor. You do not need to share it with another person in order for God to forgive you, but the Bible tells us that He heals us when we share our sin with others. (James 5:16)

11. Read the Word of God continually throughout the process. Spiritual maturity is a requirement in order to keep the freedom God so generously bestowed upon us. As we do our part, He is faithful and just to do His.

Full deliverance may not be immediate, but progressive as we begin to understand more about the sinful nature of our “flesh.” and as we continue to look into the various areas of our life that have been affected by demonic influence. We can put a label on them, such as; “character defects,” or “short-comings,” but the bottom line is that they all stem from sin, and need to be addressed as sin in order for them to be properly dealt with. All those unhealthy spiritual connections need to be addressed, confessed, and renounced, leading to new levels of freedom.

Remember, you can’t do this alone. You need your Creator to do this for you. He knows where you have been, and even more important, has a purpose and plan for your life. Give yourself to Him, allow Him to perform this process in your life and prepare for the transformation that will usher you into God’s peace, fulfillment and purpose.

Dr. Robert Tucker is the Director of New Life Spirit Recovery. He also trains and equips men and women to become certified drug and alcohol counselors for the state of California, utilizing biblical principles.

October 10, 2011May 25, 2019

The 12 Steps from a Biblical Perspective Series: Steps 1-3 From Powerless to All Powerful

From Powerless to All-Power in Christ

by Dr. Robert T. Tucker

As we prepare to take a deeper look at the 12 steps, the most important thing to remember is that Jesus loves each of us regardless of where we came from or what we’ve done. He understands exactly what happened, where things went wrong and wants to help us become healthy, productive members of His body. He wants us to come to Him for help just as we are. When we submit to Him, He changes us little by little from the inside out, one day at a time. What we get out of recovery will directly reflect what we put into it. Yes, it does require effort on our part.

Remember, it is God’s desire that we spend eternity with Him. If you are reading this, you can be confidently assured that He is calling you (tugging at your heart) and wants you. Do you know that not everyone will make it to heaven? Do you realize that you have been given the opportunity of a lifetime? The Bible says that narrow is the road to heaven, and here we are traveling it. This is truly a gift. As people caught up in bondage to addictive behaviors, our only hope for freedom is in Jesus. We must grab on to Him for dear life, and never let go. If and when we ask for help, we can rest assured that He will be right there at our side ready and willing to help every step of the way. His transforming power will not only set us free and keep us free, but will also change us into exactly who He created us to be. It is impossible for us to change on our own and God knows this, but He can and will change us if we allow Him to have His way with us. Jesus makes it clear that we can do all things through Christ who gives us strength. “All things” include staying clean and sober.

Do you have intentional sinful behavior in your life? Things you are doing you know are wrong, yet choosing to do anyway while trying to convince your self and others that your behavior is “not that bad” and that God “understands”? Yes, God does understand and will forgive you if and when you confess and repent, but there are always consequences for unrighteous acts. The Bible says that sin leads to death and eventually it will, and the path it takes you down can be long and painful.

Understanding Steps One, Two and Three

The purpose of this lesson is to introduce the first three steps of the 12-step program, giving you a comprehensive biblical perspective of just what these steps are about. In essence, steps one through three take us from a state of powerlessness, helplessness and hopelessness to a state of having all power, help and hope in Christ! The first 3 steps must be fully and successfully accomplished in order for the remaining steps to properly work.

Let’s take some time to review these steps:

Step One – “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.”

Step Two – “Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.”

Step Three – “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.”

When I teach Step One as the most significant step, I’m often questioned why. My answer is fairly simple; a life changing third step cannot possibly be achieved without a proper first step. I believe the first step is not a time we choose but rather a divine appointment, a place we arrive at in life. Right around this time, the addict begins to see what everyone else was seeing all along. It is what is known as coming out of denial. The second part of the first step “that our lives had become unmanageable” is the much needed evidence used to properly accomplish the step’s overall objective “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol.” We must be able to see it and believe it before we can honestly do something about it. A person is unable to successfully move beyond this point until this first truth becomes part of his reality. No one seeks a solution for a problem they don’t believe exists and God is the only one able to open blind eyes and deaf ears. Furthermore, just as it is written, NO one knows the Father but the Son and those the Son chooses to reveal Him to. The whole recovery process hinges upon this and only begins in God’s perfect timing.

A thorough Step One properly prepares for the placement of The Foundation needed for a successful program to be built upon. It removes self from the throne in preparation for the True Rock to be set in place. As one successfully transitions through the first three steps, what transpires is a sincere belief that;

(1) he cannot possibly experience victory on his own

Step One – “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.”
- (2 Corinthians 1:9) We had great burdens there that were beyond our own strength. We even gave up hope of living. ⁹Truly, in our own hearts we believed we would die. But this happened so we would not trust in ourselves but in God, who raises people from the dead.”
- (Proverbs 28:26) Trusting oneself is foolish, but those who walk in [God’s] wisdom are safe.

(2) there is One that can and will help if He is asked

Step Two – “Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.”
- (1 Cor. 1:24,25) – But Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God to those people God has called—Jews and Greeks. ²⁵Even the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
- (1 Timothy 2:5-6) – For there is only one God and one Mediator who can reconcile God and people. He is the man Christ Jesus. ⁶He gave his life to purchase freedom for everyone. This is the message that God gave to the world at the proper time.
- (Romans 12:2) – And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

(3) victory is found only in God’s gift of salvation by receiving Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior

Step Three – “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.”

o (Acts 1:8) – But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

o (Romans 8:13-14) – If you use your lives to do the wrong things your sinful selves want, you will die spiritually. But if you use the Spirit’s help to stop doing the wrong things you do with your body, you will have true life. ¹⁴The true children of God are those who let God’s Spirit lead them.

o (Proverbs 3:5-6) – Trust in the LORD with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek His will in all you do, and He will direct your paths.

o (Philippians 4:13) – I can do all things through Christ, because he gives me strength.

A successful third step depends on the God-given free will choice that is made. Without Jesus one can at most remain abstinent. With Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, true recovery begins. It is His transformation process that becomes our progress towards His perfection.

Many that were misinformed wonder why the program is not working for them. Accepting God’s gift of salvation is an important choice that He always welcomes with open arms. This is just the beginning of a new life. The first problem surfaces when His Lordship is conveniently left out. Confession, profession, salvation and forgiveness are appealing ideals that are usually grasped, but two other very important ingredients, repentance and His Lordship are often overlooked. It is not uncommon for someone to want to be saved and forgiven, but not be the slightest bit interested in giving up the control they think they have and/or unwilling to repent of their ways. We eventually learn that half measures avail us nothing.

We have a God of reconciliation that created each one of us specifically for His pleasure. Yes, He loves us that much and only wants the best for His precious children. He paid a high price to bring us out of captivity, snatching us back from the prince of this world like a father retrieving his children from a kidnapper.

Have you already surrendered your life to Jesus Christ? If you have not, there is not a better day then today to do that. Steps One through Three can happen right now, if you allow God access.

Receive Jesus into your heart – ask for the gift of salvation, and make Him the Lord of your life!

Please look for our next publication as we begin to study steps 4, 5 &6.

Talk to an Addiction Specialist

Books