Category: Brokenness

Either Way…I Still Praise Him.

You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.
(David, Psalm 139:5)

We are distressed/hard-pressed/troubled/squeezed on every side…
(Paul, 2 Corinthians 4:8)

Nobody puts ‘Baby’ in a corner.
(Johnny Castle, Dirty Dancing)

I’m feeling ‘hemmed in’ these days. Diminished. Limited. Grounded, like a teenager: no keys, no car, no friends. Just school, then home.

On top of that, I feel cornered. Outnumbered.

It’s redolent of a scene in Thor where the Viking hero and his compatriots infiltrate the Frost Giant’s lair and are met by a relentless enemy in wave after wave, each giant becoming more formidable than the last and more numerous than before.

Yeah, that captures it nicely.

On every front a vexing battle is being waged and it seems like I am losing ground.

Ministry.

Family.

Finances.

Friends.

Health.

Some fronts are more like skirmishes while others border on “Shock and Awe.” These days I look like the Arizona border, Iraq (in March, 2003) and Afghanistan all rolled into one. Continue reading Either Way…I Still Praise Him.

Father’s Day From A Prodigal’s Perspective

Today I propose we do a little what if-ing. Let’s “what-if?” the story that contains the prodigal son. It pretty much leaves us with some open-ended questions, I know.

Did Dad ever want to wring the son’s neck? Ever?

Where was Mom in all this?

What happened six weeks or six months later?

Did the kid suffer a relapse?

Questions.

So…let’s pretend.

Imagine if Father’s Day fell a week following the prodigal son’s return. No, check that. Let’s pretend it occurred about six or seven months later. On that morning, the father—let’s call him Chanan (Hebrew for gracious)—awakens from a dreamless sleep and rubs his eyes so as to roust them from their hours of inertia. It is still dark, but an oil lamp casts a coppery glow inside the master’s bedroom, and he looks at the pleasing, sleeping form of his wife—oh, may as well: Chana. Hannah. Grace. Continue reading Father’s Day From A Prodigal’s Perspective

Words of a Recovering Junkie.

I asked my son’s permission to copy and post this from his Facebook page. We are rejoicing in the faithfulness of God in His handling of our son. Oh, he is so good to us! How He loves prodigals and longs to see them home…

Here it is, completely unedited, as is. That’s what makes it so powerful:

Hi my name is Graham and I’m a drug addict. This is a little about me. This is coming from a recovering addict of everything I put my hands on. Meth was my drug of choice. I wish meth would’ve never been invented. I was so trapped in the chains of addiction to meth that I didn’t care about myself or anyone else. I begged borrowed stole and hustled daily to get high. I will forever be haunted by the memories of myself and the things I’ve done. Meth changed who I was. I became this “zombie” who cared nothing about anything other than the drug. Thankfully I have a God who cared enough about me to stop me before it was too late. A year ago I was cashing fake checks for a dealer of mine so that I could have money to buy whatever I wanted. Out of the thousands of dollars I stole, I have only one thing to show for it, I bought a 400 dollar cell phone a few days before I was arrested and thankfully I still have it. I also bought two cd’s: Gucci mane Back to the trap house and Outkast stankonia. (I don’t have those anymore.) The rest went to Oxycontin 80’s Roxie 30’s and meth. I was arrested 4-22-10 with 9 counts of forgery (felony) and 3 counts of theft by deception (felony) not to mention I was on first offender probation for Possession of marijuana with intent (felony). Needless to say I wasn’t getting out. I did 6 months in the county jail and six months in Coastal State Prison then Clayton County CI. God had to slow me down. I was on the path to death. I am thankful for it. I wish you would never try meth. It will destroy you. Trust me. I could tell you all this till I’m blue in the face and you’re going to do whatever you want and there’s nothing anyone can do to stop you. But for the people who are still chained to addiction, my prayers go out to you. I am not perfect in any way trust me, but I’m doing my best. I feel better about myself. I have made amends to my family and we are doing great. To all the people I stole from, robbed, cheated, and tricked, saying sorry isn’t enough, but I’m sorry. I’m not the same person, and I work daily to become a better person. This is my curse. This is what I have to deal with daily. But today I will wake up and chose to be sober. Today I chose not to be a zombie. I chose life to the fullest. Not a fake world of illusions that drugs brings but a real world. It’s funny as I was writing this; I got a call from Johnny’s Pizza. I got the job! I start tomorrow. My God is an awesome dude. He helped me break the chain of addiction in my life, granted me parole, and got a 3 time convicted felon, currently on parole, tatted to the gills, a job within a month of my release. Sweet. Thank you God.