JER 2:13 My people have committed two sins: They have
forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold
water.
A cistern was like a personal well that people kept water in to meet their daily
needs, and addiction is like a personal well that we dig in order to meet our needs and to quench our emotional thirsts.
But the well of addiction leaks and only holds muddy water at the bottom to drink. Addiction promises a lot and looks like
a nice fresh well at first, but soon it starts cracking, and in the end all we have left is a dusty, empty well, and an even greater thirst.
God is a continual spring of Living Water and not just a temporary well, and He wants us to come to Him to receive what
we need. One of the things that can help us to give up our broken wells of addiction and to start drinking from the wellspring
of life, is to tell ourselves the truth about what addiction is actually doing to us. Below is a number of truths that
start with "Un" about addiction that you can use to help yourself quit, and to stay quit for good.
Addiction is actually very:
Unhealthy- Addiction usually progressively destroys our health and most addictions
can eventually or abruptly kill us. It also fogs up our thinking and causes us to be more angry, agitated, aggressive,
and abusive. Addiction brings sickness to every area of our lives.
Unholy- Addiction is idolatry (fake God), and anyone that sees us practicing an addiction
knows that we do not fully trust in God and have a "fear of life" problem. Since addiction progressively kills our bodies, God
may see it as a form of slow suicide and condemn us.
Unproductive- Addiction usually keeps us stuck in life and tied to our constant need
to have it closely available. Usually when we have an addiction it keeps us as a slave to it, and all forward progress
stops until the addiction ends. Addiction is nothing more than a big waste.
Uneconomical- We spend a lot of money on addiction that really could and should go
to more needful things like bills or family needs. Plus we steal from others, or even our own families budget in order
to support our addictions. It creates legal and recovery bills as well.
Unnecessary- Most addiction is just being used to treat old unhealed emotional pain, or to
guard against any new pain. We use it because of fear, don't really need it, and can actually live without it if we really
wanted to. You'll find in time that most of our need is in our minds.
Unstable- Usually addiction makes us very unstable in every area of our lives; emotionally,
vocationally, spiritually, physically, and relationally. A life with an addiction is a life that lacks any lasting stability,
and it just creates constant stress and strife for anyone involved.
Unfair- Addiction is "life-cheating" because we are all required to live and face life
naturally in order to teach us to become interdependent with God and man, and to choose or reject God honestly. Addiction
pulls us out of, and buffers us from normal life, which is very unfair.
Unsafe- Addiction can get us into serious trouble with our health and with the legal
system and it takes a normally peaceful life and makes it a very scary place to live in not just for us, but for those
connected to us. Addiction places us and those we love in very real danger.
If you want to see how quitting your addiction can benefit your life just take the
"Un's" off of most of the words above. It seems really fearful to imagine our lives without the security of our addictions,
but once you are away from them for a while, you see just how much better your life can be, and exactly how
much damage it has been doing. The hardest part about quitting our addiction is simply fear. Fear of being harmed and thinking
we are now unable to protect ourselves without some controllable, administerable, pleasure to run to. And fear
of being vulnerable to other peoples harmful control again. But in time after we quit we see that many of those fears
are unfounded, and that all conflict can be worked through with God and people's help. Learn to "face it afraid" if necessary
as you trust in God to be what you need. It's time for us to face our "Un's", and to start drinking from God's wellspring
of Living Water.
REV 7:17 For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will
lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.
