Addiction.

Lately I've been seriously thinking about addiction. And substance abuse. And hope. And getting people unhooked. And I've been thinking about the things that I'm addicted to. And how the apostle Paul says in Corinthians "Food for the stomach and the stomach for food but I will not be mastered by anything." I don't want to be mastered by anything. I don't want to be in bondage to anything. And my heart breaks as I look around and see countless people addicted. To substances. To sex. To violence. To pleasure. To lies. To false hopes. To money. To food. To anything and everything that is flashy and eye catching or dull and promising. Addicted. Trapped. Enslaved. No hope. No promise, or even glimpse of escape. Stuck.

Five times in the last two weeks I've had the opportunity to encourage people addicted to substances: alcohol, cocaine, marijuana; to be free from their bondage. Five times I've said "It's not about what I want. It's about where you are and what you want. You don't have to quit. But I promise you that if you decide you want to, you can." Five times I've talked about support groups and accountability and replacing the addiction with something else. And then I read this and it just hit me... this is what I'd done five times. This is truth. Here freedom is available. Check this out... it's taken from the book "Sex God" by Rob Bell.

There's a passage in the book of Ephesians where it's written, "Those who have been stealing must steal no longer." Which is quite straightforward - don't steal. But the passage doesn't end there. It continues: "but must work, doing something useful with their own hands." But it doesn't stop there. It ends with: "that they may have something to share with those in need."

On the first read, the instructions seem as basic as it gets. But there is much going on here just below the surface. First, the command doesn't stop with the "don't" part. The writer understands that that kind of instruction rarely helps. When we're told not to do something, how often are we truly compelled not to do it, especially if we enjoy it? If it's just me against the lust, the odds are already against me.

But there's something else going on here.

Stealing involves large amounts of adrenaline. The rush of planning, pulling it off, not getting caught, getting something for nothing. And then there's the expectation of next time. If we got something this significant for free, could we steal something even more valuable? What if we raised the stakes, hit a store with a better security system, tested ourselves? Stealing involves the senses, the intellect, a person's fear threshold. It even has a powerful social dynamic. Stealing with someone creates powerful bonds between people. When our adrenaline is pumping, that's a physiological phenomenon. It feels good becasue things are happening with the chemicals in our bodies, with our nerves and brain and bloodstream. If we do that enough, our bodies get used to it.

We could use the word addicted. A person gets addicted to it.

If you tell a person who's stealing not to, and you leave it at that, you've taken something away, but you haven't replaced it with anything. That's why the instructions in Ephesians are so brilliant. The urging to stop stealing is followed by the command to have the person do "something useful with their own hands". The word useful is the Greek word agathos, which is also translated "good" and "benevolent".

Why does the writer mention the hands? Because you steal with your hands. Stealing is a sensory experience, an adrenaline rush involving the hands. The command is to replace one adrenaline rush with another, a better one, one that's good. But it doesn't stop there. The command ends with the person who was stealing learning to do something good with their hands so that they can take care of the needs of someone else. Stealing is about taking from someone. This passage is about giving to someone who has less because you have more. Stealing is the ultimate in being selfish. Making something and giving it away is the ultimate in being generous.

This passage is about something central to what it means to be human. It's about desire. It's about the thief finding something they'll desire more than stealing.

"You thought taking things for free was a rush? Try giving free food to someone who's starving!"

The writer of Ephesians understands that to tell the thief not to steal and leave it at that doesn't have a very high chance of being helpful. The thief will be left with a battle on their hands that will pit them against their craving.

Whatever it is that has its hooks in you, you will never be free from it until you find something you want more. It's not about getting rid of desire. It's about giving ourselves over to bigger and better and more powerful desires.

What if I could empower others to give themselves over to bigger and better and more powerful desires? What if I did that like St. Francis of Assisi and I "preached the gospel at all times but rarely used words"? Christ is the ultimate desire, the bigger, the better, the all powerful solution to any kind of craving and addiction as in Him is real freedom. And what if I could be a part of pointing others to Him simply by encouraging them to search for something with which to replace their desire? To search for something that is bigger and better and more powerful? Wouldn't they eventually accidentally simply just bump into Christ? Because if not, I wanna know what desire is bigger, better, and more powerful than the freedom He offers.

I don't think there is one.