I don’t know the statistics that say just how many families are affected by addiction, but I do know that every family in my personal circle has some story about someone in their family that just “went off the deep end”. I dare say that I’m on the only person who can attest to this phenomenon that is sweeping through our communities at a highly destructive rate of speed.
I remember when I was a small child growing up in Dyer. My mom worked at Brown Shoe and every other kid’s mom did too. There were red lights in town to control the twelve o’clock traffic alone. Businesses were flourishing and our town was clean. Our parents were not afraid to let us kids go out into the community and ride our bikes all over town if we wanted because if we got into trouble, there was always another mom who was watching and knew just whose mom to call. Cocaine was not quite unheard of , but it was kept quiet enough that us children didn’t know anything about it.
Aside from our insane federal government and poor economy, what has happened to our community as we once knew it? How do we explain how we got to a place where it’s not safe to let our kids out of our sight because we know what’s waiting around the corner?
Just why are so many of our families destroyed by drug addiction? Why do we hear so many stories of the good people in our community just “going off the deep end?”
I have had experience with drug addiction and have now made it my life long goal to come against it in any way possible. Here is what I have come up with:
- Drug addiction is not a disease, a moral dilemma, a character flaw, or something that just happens. It IS by-product of sin that progresses into what the Bible calls a stronghold.
- Drug addiction is not a mystery or some great phenomenon that is a shock to God. It IS a prophecy being fulfilled. God knew that this was going to happen to our community, to our nation, and to our world. He is all knowing and that is why He gave us Christians specific instructions on how to come against these things.
In Revelation 18:23, John the Revelator tells us the great men of the earth will deceive all nations by their sorceries. The word “sorcery” in this passage is the Greek word “pharmakeia” (Strong’s #5331 far-mak-i-ah). This is the source of the English word “pharmaceutical”. Today the most powerful men of the earth are the men who own or control global corporations. Who are these men? Oil companies are number one and Pharmaceutical companies are number two. This verse foretells of a global deception that will take place and it will be performed by these “great men” of the earth.
If we believe what the Bible says, we must act like it. Jesus said that “unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required” (LK 12:48). We are a community full of Christians – full of Christians who either have a family member or neighbor fall prey to the claws of drug addiction. We can’t do mjuch legally about what is happening.
But the Bible tells us exactly what to do. We must unite as a community and look to the bible for the answers and be ready to do what believers did back then. In 2 Chronicles 20, when a great army threatened to overtake King Jehosaphat, he gathered his community of people and declared a fast and they all sought the Lord. Jehosaphsat cried out to the living God and said, “we have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do: but our eyes are upon thee.” The Bible tells us that all Judah stood before the Lord with their little ones, their wives, and their children. They came together as a community and they prayed. What was the result? In verses 22-24 we see that “when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushments against the children of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, which were come against Judah; and they were smitten”.
By prayer and by praise, the enemies destroyed themselves and the children of Judah did not have to touch any of them!
As New Testament Christians, we know that “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world” (Ephesians 6:12). Are we wrestling against this darkness that has fallen over our land or are we just going to church on Sunday and sitting back Monday through Saturday watching helplessly as our loved ones are swallowed up by the “rulers of the dark world”?
What can we do? We can gather as a community and fast and pray these strongholds off of our community just like the Bible tells us to do and take back what the rulers of the dark world are stealing from us. There is power in unified prayer and fasting.
Will we stand up and fight against it as Jesus would have us to do or will we sit back and mourn as our children are devoured?
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