Counting the Cost: The Cost of Addiction

As the addict struggles this week, it is time to step back and count costs. What is the cost of continuing down the path of acting out? What is the cost of addiction?

In the First Step, addicts make the following acknowledgment:

"We admitted we were powerless over addictive behavior --- that our lives had become unmanageable."

Part of the unmanageability is the costs associated with acting: emotional, financial, physical, and spiritual costs. The addict, as an exercise, attempted once in the past to calculate the financial cost of his addiction. For this addict, the cost was somewhere in the neighborhood of $30,000.

Past costs of addiction for this addict: loss of work (twice), loss of a marriage, estrangement from children, loss of self-worth.

Humbled from these costs, the addict embarked on a program of recovery. The addict's program included both 12-Step meetings and group counseling in a Christian recovery environment.



Lately, the addict has entered another period of struggle with acting-out. Acting-out has become an almost every day occurrence and the addict is a bit scared. It is as if the addict has forgot about the costs of addiction. It is as if the addict has turned his back on all the lessons of recovery. It is as if the addict has traded in growth, friendship, and support for that fleeting and diminishing moment of pleasure brought on by acting-out.

Insanity pursues the addict.

So this morning the addict began to think seriously about costs. What is acting-out costing the addict today?

This week alone has been costly for the addict. Acting-out has meant 10-15 hours of lost productivity at the office (putting the addict farther behind in his work, creating stress, and burdening the addict with shame and remorse). Acting-out caused the addict to be late in picking up his youngest daughter from daycare. Acting out led the addict to lie to friends and family this week. Acting out pushed the addict into isolation when he was having his evening with the Chatty Chatty Princess. Acting out caused the addict to ignore phone calls from his children from his first marriage.

And the addict should not fool himself any longer: If it continues, acting out will cause the addict to lose his job. And losing his job because of continuing addictive behavior will lead to the loss of a second marriage.

These are very real and very dire consequences. And the addict ignores them daily.

At this point in recovery, the addict is back to Step One:

The addict's is powerless over his addictive behavior -- the addict's life has become unmanageable.

Purpose Driven Life: Day 18

EXPERIENCING LIFE TOGETHER



POINT TO PONDER:

I need others in my life.


VERSE TO REMEMBER:

"Bear one another's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." [Gal 6:2]


RICK WARREN'S THOUGHTS:

Life is meant to be shared.

God intends for us to experience life together. The Bible calls this shared experience fellowship.

Real fellowship is so much more than just showing up at services. It is experiencing life together. It includes unselfish loving, honest sharing, practical serving, sacrificial giving, sympathetic comforting, and all the other "one another" commands found in the New Testament.

"For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them." [Matt 18:20].

In real fellowship, people experience:

+ authenticity;
+ mutuality;
+ sympathy; and
+ mercy.

Mutuality is the heart of fellowship: building reciprocal relationships, sharing responsibilities, and helping each other.

The Bible commands mutual accountability, mutual encouragement, mutual serving, and mutual honoring.

You are not responsible for everyone in the Body of Christ, but you are responsible to them. God expects you to do whatever you can to help them.

Sympathy meets two fundamental human needs: the need to be understood and the need to have your feelings validated. Everytime you understand and affirm someone's feelings, you build fellowship.

There are different levels of fellowship, and each is appropriate at different times. The simplest levels of fellowship are the fellowship of sharing and the fellowship of studying God's Word together. A deeper level is the fellowship of serving, as when we minister together on mission trips and mercy projects. The deepest most intense level is the fellowship of suffering, where we enter into each other's pain and grief and carry each other's burdens.

Fellowship is a place of grace, where mistakes aren't rubbed in but rubbed out. Fellowship happens where mercy wins over justice.

"Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." [Col 3:13].


D-MONK'S THOUGHTS:

Fellowship has always been a challenge for me and my spirituality. I tend to be an introvert when it comes to the spiritual. I like to look for God in solitude, reading, meditation, and deep thought.

But community seems to be where we as people grow and find meaning. There is definitely something to the thought that "Life is meant to be shared."

I think about this often when I travel. The real disappointment of a business trip is not being able to share certain experiences. If I am in Washington, DC, St. Louis, or Las Vegas, I really want to be able to share what I am seeing with someone else, either my Beloved or a close friend. These types of experiences mean much more when shared.

So it makes sense that fellowship is a key component to the Christian life. God wants us to share the experience of redemption and grace.