Month: December 2018

I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh . . . Joel 2:28 When I went to residency, my lifestyle radically changed. I spent more time in the hospital, had less time for exercise, and abandoned healthy eating habits. After a year, I couldn’t quite figure out why the guy in the mirror was…
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I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten . . . Joel 2:25 A friend in jail once told me that he loved to sleep, because in his dreams, he wasn’t in jail. When he awoke though, the pain of his situation came crashing down. Waking up every day to the…
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Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. Joel 2:13 Few people are as well acquainted with repeated failure as the addict. Torn between a desire for recovery and a voracious appetite for destruction, the addict wants a new life, but lives enslaved to…
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Return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments. Joel 2:12 We cannot recover for anyone else. We may help an addict find recovery, but if one doesn’t want to change, it is impossible to force that person to change. Often though, the…
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Awake, you drunkards, and weep, and wail, all you drinkers of wine, because of the sweet wine, for it is cut off from your mouth. Joel 1:5 In medical school, I learned cynical, yet accurate, statements like these: All bleeding stops, and Every smoker quits eventually. Though satirical, they are no joke, but rather, they are painful statements of futility describing…
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When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. The more they were called, the more they went away. Hosea 11:1-2 I have often wished that the Christian life was more passive. I have longed for that button that I push just one time, turning my will over to…
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Sow for yourselves righteousness; reap steadfast love; break up your fallow ground, for it is the time to seek the Lord, that he may come and rain righteousness upon you. Hosea 10:12 In addiction, we often talk about those who are not at rock bottom yet. Though they may have lost jobs and families, they just…
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Israel is a luxuriant vine that yields its fruit. The more his fruit increased, the more altars he built . . . Hosea 10:1 Everyone addict in recovery has situations in which he is at a higher risk for relapse. A return to old using friends, a life trauma, newfound freedom, loneliness, or fatigue can all…
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For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. Hosea 8:7 In today’s passage, God issues a blistering judgment upon the wandering Israelites. In it, he says that though they claim to follow him (Hosea 8:2), still, they create the idols of their own destruction (Hosea 8:4). As they follow their own path,…
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I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. Hosea 6:6 When I first attempted recovery, I didn’t need relapse prevention because I knew I’d never be stupid enough to return to addiction. I discovered that occasional failure is disaster for the addict and that I did indeed need relapse…
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