By Beth Livingston
Certified Recovery Specialist
During Easter we’re reminded of Jesus Christ’s horrific moments: false accusations, treated like a criminal, arrested, beaten, mocked, spit on, and eventually nailed to a cross where he suffered and died. (See Luke 22-23) Could it be that we, in our addictions and other unwanted behaviors, have felt some of these same things?
My friend, Patty, went back home after spending a year in a residential rehab for crack cocaine addiction. Because of her tainted history, her family had no trust in her ability to remain clean. She could make a trip to the grocery store and end up being accused of scoring some crack while she was out. The verbal assault came first, then they’d search her room, the car, and check the messages on her cell phone. She ended up feeling falsely accused and humiliated – treated like a criminal.
Our jails and prisons are filled with people who were arrested for their sale, possession, and/or use of illegal substances or over-use of alcohol. Others have been arrested for behaviors that became criminally violent without any substance at all.
Many who attend recovery programs or seek counseling have experienced some semblance of what Christ encountered on his way to the cross. The HUGE difference between Christ’s experience and ours is that He had done NOTHING to deserve the mistreatment. He spent 33 years on this earth and never sinned, never did anything “unholy” or questionable. Yet, here he was – being treated like one of the world’s most dangerous, despicable criminals. Why?
Why didn’t he stand up for justice, demand that his torturers be bound and thrown into hell, and call all of the angels from heaven to bring a holy showdown there at Calvary? The answer is simple – so that all of mankind would have the opportunity to be forgiven and turn from their sins and spend eternity with Him in Heaven. He was murdered for all of our sins, all of our addictions, all of our poor choices – so we wouldn’t have to be. Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Jesus Christ paid for our problems with his life. He wanted to give us power from on high to defeat sin in our lives. Romans 6:10-11 says, “When he died, he died once to break the power of sin. But now that he lives, he lives for the glory of God. So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Jesus Christ.”
Once every 12 weeks in our recovery group we prayerfully consider what we need victory over in our lives, that’s been dogging us and we need a breakthrough. When we have determined what that is for each of us, we name it by writing it on a thin, small piece of paper and one by one take the hammer and a nail and nail that problem to the wooden cross in our meeting place. There is something powerful and moving that happens as you nail your problems to the cross. As you pound that nail, you understand that Jesus was nailed to the cross for that problem of yours. What would you nail there today? Take every step you can to get free.