Numbers 11:4-6, 10-20
Last week we saw how humans were banished by God from the garden of Eden and required to walk “across the desert,” by faith, in order to grow into healthy mature people. The addict (stay open to the possibility that we are all addicted to something) is someone who resists this, wanting instead to go back into the garden by “using.” Again, the Israelites demonstrate this in the desert by wanting to go back to Egypt, the place of their slavery. Why do people freely choose to be enslaved?
Resources Recommended and Used by Pastor Mark:
- Addiction and Grace: Love and Spirituality in Healing Addictions, Gerald May … He sees all humans as struggling with addiction and all in need of grace.
- Addiction Nation: What the Opioid Crisis Reveals About Us, Timothy McMahan King… Goes deep into causes of opioid addiction and how addiction is part of everyone’s life.
- Breathing Underwater: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps, Richard Rohr … Brings the gospel to the 12-step program in a way that is applicable to everyone.
- The Recovering: Intoxication and It’s Aftermath, Leslie Jamison … Not a Christian, she is very raw about her struggle with alcohol as a writer, very insightful as to how alcohol functions as an addiction.
- A Prayer for Orion: A Son’s Addiction and a Mother’s Love, Katherine James … Very personal story about her son’s heroin addiction and how it affected her.
- Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary on Sin, Cornelius Plantinga … The whole book is very insightful on how sin works but chapter 8 explores the relationship between sin and addiction.
- Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, Tim Keller … Explores the biblical category of idolatry, the closest term in the bible for addiction.
- Addiction: The Invisible Dragon, Chip Dodd … A 5-page piece on addictions from a Christian perspective, very enlightening.