Con Man

And on the third day, behold, a man came from Saul’s camp, with his clothes torn and dirt on his head. And when he came to David, he fell to the ground and paid homage. 2 Samuel 1:2

While struggling with the shame of my addiction, one well-meaning counselor introduced me to the disease model. Addiction is a disease, like brain cancer. You wouldn’t feel ashamed for having brain cancer, right? In one sense, he was right. I didn’t choose this pathologic appetite for drugs. The problem with the disease model though, was that my counselor was using it to absolve me of all responsibility. Your wife wouldn’t be angry at you if you had brain cancer. This is no different.

It was different though. I had cancer once. It was a relatively minor cancer, effectively treated with surgery, but it didn’t make me lie, cheat, or steal. And from my wife’s experience, that was probably the most hurtful thing about my addiction. All the interpersonal conflict stemming from my drug use wasn’t directly about putting the drug in my body. Rather, my wife was hurt by the betrayal of trust – by the lying, cheating, and stealing that surrounded the drug use. It was the deception that hurt the most.

Deception is the tool of the con man and it’s a tool that goes hand in hand with addiction. Most of us who’ve been addicted have hidden our behavior, becoming professional liars – con men. Then, when our deceit was revealed, trust was broken, which is a difficult thing to recover from. Once a con man is exposed, one would be a fool to believe in him (or her) again.

Today’s passage is about a con man and the price he paid for his deception. In the story, a messenger came, with torn clothes and a dirty face, to bring David news about King Saul’s death. He’d supposedly come directly from the battlefield where he claimed to have killed Saul himself. Hoping to secure a reward, he attempted to manipulate David’s deepest motivations for personal gain. The messenger had no way of knowing however, that David considered it a terrible crime to kill God’s anointed and so, he had the messenger put to death. This con man got what he deserved.

I do subscribe to the disease model of addiction. I didn’t choose to have this pathologic appetite for drugs. Addiction though, is a disease that is characterized by pathologic behavior and I am always responsible for my behavior. I don’t have to live enslaved to my disease. It’s always my choice and responsibility to get help and seek recovery. If I don’t purposefully treat my disease, my life will take its natural course of a con man, killing everything important to me. If I don’t want that diseased life, then daily, I must do what it takes to abandon the ways of a con man, embracing honesty.