Weeping With Addicts

On Saturday night, we returned home from a road trip at 1 AM. We looked everywhere but couldn’t find my medication lock box. Since it was so late, and we’d be getting up in a couple hours for church anyway, I decided just to go to bed. On Sunday morning, I woke up already in full withdrawal from one particularly potent prescription (Venlafaxine). We found my lockbox and I took my prescription, but it took the whole day of chills, trembling, nausea, and dizziness (etc) to recover.

Repeatedly in the Gospels, we see several stories of people asking for signs so they can believe in Jesus. They are unwilling to believe in something they cannot see, touch or experience. Jesus calls those people lacking in faith.

I know what I experienced was a minor withdrawal compared to what others go through, but I still have a new sense of compassion for addicts. It is scary to feel out of control and in so much pain. But this type of compassion should have already been cultivated in my life before I ever experienced it firsthand.  I know a God who has experienced this and so much more and He has commanded me to love my neighbors by offering grace and compassion in their time of need. My own lack of compassion for those hurting has little to do with whether or not I agree with how that person got into this situation and everything to do with my faith in Jesus Christ.

Romans 12:15 says, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” No understanding, details or context required.

Something Christians need to understand is that, when they are counseling those who are hurting, we don’t know what it is like to be them. And that is ok. God created us all different, only Jesus knows what it is truly like to walk around in someone else’s shoes. However, just because we don’t know what it feels like to be an addict, to have been raped, to have a porn problem — that doesn’t mean we cannot love and help those people. Our job as Christians isn’t to fix people, it is to point them back to the only One who can fix them. And when we do this truthfully, filled with love and compassion, we aren’t being hypocrites. We are worshiping Jesus Christ by obeying His commandments.