That Thing I Can’t Let Go Of

It became a snare to Gideon and to his family. Judges 8:27

In some recovery meetings I’ve been to, they take time halfway through the meeting to smoke. I’ve also worked at an impatient treatment facility where they have a designated smoking area and take smoke breaks. This has always struck me as bizarre. There we are, seeking recovery from drugs or alcohol, while purposefully facilitating the use of a drug that kills far more people every year than fentanyl. In talking to the one who’s recovering from drugs or alcohol, he (or she) will likely say something like this – I can only give up one thing at a time. I’m working on it, but right now, giving up smoking would just be too much.

I get it. I’ve been there. When I first tried to quit opioids, I clung to my chewing tobacco, unable to let it go. I honestly thought that if I just had one little bad habit, that it would help me avoid bigger bad habits. I convinced myself that tobacco was actually good for me if it kept me off pills. It had the opposite effect of course. Letting one little thing slide made me more prone to let bigger things slide. As long as I insisted on my right to keep my tobacco, I was going to keep relapsing. Little things matter.

Gideon discovered this in today’s passage. In it, we’re told how he freed Israel from Midianite oppression and led his people out of idol worship, back to God. In his victory, he collected the spoils of war and made a golden ephod – a priestly garment – to commemorate the victory. This ephod was supposed to remind Israel of how God had delivered them, but the people came to worship it as another idol. At this point, Gideon should have destroyed it, but he couldn’t, and so, It became a snare to Gideon and to his family. Gideon did mighty things for God, but he clung to that one little idol, which later destroyed his family.

I don’t use drugs or tobacco anymore, but I’ve still got those little things to which I cling. I know they’re unhealthy, but I still want what I want. Daily then, it’s my responsibility to examine my life for those little unhealthy things which I’m tempted to tolerate – a little evil thought, a little unhealthy eating, a little lust, or a little resentment. The little things matter though, and if I know something is unhealthy, but I keep it anyway, it metastasizes. Daily then, if I desire the new life God intends, I must continue to do what it takes to cut out anything unhealthy from my life, even if it’s just a little thing.