It sounds pretty grim, and so it is. Its effect on humankind has been—is—incalculable. But had I not had this condition I could never have come to know the incredible love, mercy, and kindness of God as I do now. It is a price I would gladly pay again. I doubt, however, that others in my life would say the same thing. The toll it took on my loved ones has been horrific.
What I have found is that alcoholism, while being incurable, can be managed, but oddly enough it can only be effectively managed by an ongoing, vital, constantly growing and ever-expanding relationship with God. It is the only physical disease I am aware of that requires a relationship with God as its primary management tool.
What is so amazing about this, and what I have now come to believe, is that God somehow built a fail-safe right into my system, ensuring that in order for me to survive (and that means to not die in every way) I must seek to grow and remain in intimate relationship with him, always, in every single aspect of my life, in every single way, every single day, for the rest of my life, or I’m as good as dead or wishing I were. There is no middle path—and there can be no reservations. For me … to drink is to die.
Over the years I have slowly come to see what an incredible blessing my alcoholism has turned out to be. God loved me so much that he has not only kept me alive but designed me so that in order to stay that way I must have genuine closeness and intimacy with him. If I walk in the freedom of loving him and in the joy of doing his will instead of my own … if I love others as a way of life, what a blessing to myself and to them! God is the only strength that can relieve me of the obsession to drink. I cannot afford secret sins or unyieldedness in any area of my life that he puts his finger on—besides, who wants to carry around the stench of rotting sin? I must remain in the sunlight of his Spirit, or I will drink again, guaranteed. In a very real sense this illness binds me to God in a way I could never have otherwise experienced.
I tremble before such love. For so many years I have cried out, asking, pleading, for God to help me, desperately begging for the strength to resist, to overcome this terrible addiction and all the sin that always goes with it. But it wasn’t until I began to see how much God actually loved me and felt the impact of that knowledge begin to slowly break over my understanding that I finally felt a surge of hope spring up in my wounded heart, and my soul began to heal and come alive.
Until that happened I had been desperately, hopelessly, agonizingly lost. I could see the shore. I could smell the deep rich soil of God’s love, but I could never seem to reach it. I could never draw any closer, no matter what I did. All of my efforts ended the same way—complete and total failure every single time. I was blind and hopeless—and freedom, it seemed, lay far beyond my reach. That was, until very recently. Having tasted utter defeat, there was more I was to experience. I was to come to see that God’s love and faithfulness was far, far greater than my failure—so, here goes …
5 Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How Many Thousands of Men and Women Have Recovered from Alcoholism, 4th ed. (New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 2008), 18.
5: The Challenge
I’ve spent an awful lot of my life just hiking from one place to the next. There was never any real reason for it. I guess I just loved being on the road is all. I was good at it. I think it was the struggle—the sense of doing the impossible—hiking coast to coast without a penny in my pocket when I’d start. I loved the sound of it—of the tires fading to nothing on an empty highway—and falling asleep, wrapped up in my bag and tarp, listening to the rain pattering down on me, gently loving me to sleep. As I think back, it seems I’ve always been headed somewhere—with nothing but me, my guitar, and one backpack. There were a few times I tried to settle, and I would for a short time, but I just couldn’t stand it. Every time that road beckoned I would answer and leave behind everything I’d hoped to build.
I guess what drew me most was the not knowing—not knowing who I was going to meet or who I was going to see again—and not knowing what would happen next. And the people … no matter where I stopped there was always some kind of character full of surprises. It was not knowing what in the world I would see this time or where in the world the road would take me next. All of it was part of the sense of freedom I felt so profoundly that first night on the highway long ago and that eventually came to drive me mercilessly for so long.
Now being a long-haired, hitchhiking, guitar-playing, hillbilly freak took me to a lot of places that they don’t really advertise in travel brochures. If they did, there would be a box at the bottom of each one to tick for how much money you’ll send and another box for how many days of fasting and prayer you’ll commit to the place. I could go on for hours about all the bizarre places and strange situations I’ve found myself in, but I’d just get lost real quick if I did. But there was this one place …
I probably would have been in my late twenties at the time, so I was still young and spry enough to cover a lot of ground without stopping, but every once in a while, some “thing” or some “one” would catch my attention, and I’d hit the binders to linger a bit.
I was drifting through the Rockies to the Okanagan Valley and passed through a little place called Falkland. It’s nestled in a mountain pass off the main highway just about halfway between Kamloops and Vernon. The entire population of the town and its environs was only about two hundred souls. That’s in tourist season. Its claim to fame was a surprisingly large bar at which the Hells Angels held their annual biker rally—that, and the local witch, who had a bi-weekly question and answer radio show broadcast over most of BC. I didn’t find any of this out till after I had been there a while.
Anyways, I had some cash, so I figured I’d stop at the bar, drink a few beers, play some pool, and meet a few of the locals—perhaps maybe do some picking. That’s pretty much how I supported myself already over the years. I could play the mandolin, harmonica, and guitar, and I sang pretty well too. At least that’s what people told me.
The pool table was at the front of the bar, which was pretty crowded, so I couldn’t help brushing up against a girl who was standing at the table playing. I said “excuse me” and lightly touched her with my hand to let her know I was passing by.
Well, literally the instant I touched her she just sort of crumpled up and went down on one knee to the floor. She glanced around behind her at me, startled, and exclaimed, “Knocked me over with a feather!” (I’ve often wondered about what she meant by that.) Then she straightened up and had a good look at me. I apologized immediately, even though I hadn’t the slightest idea what had just happened, and said, “So sorry, I didn’t mean to!” and then carefully made my way over to the bar. I was intrigued now by what had just happened, so I ordered a beer and then moved to a spot where I could look but not be looked at.
My ability to assess people is huge when I focus. For the kind of life I lived, it really had to be, or I could be in real serious trouble, real quick. I’ve spent many hours observing and analyzing people’s motives and behaviour over the years, and as I watched her, I knew intuitively there was some sort of strong spiritual component in her life. I’ve always seemed to be able to sense stuff like that in other people and was always drawn to it. I was also rarely wrong about it either, for good or bad.
She was quite a skilled pool player, so I decided to challenge the table. At that time in my life you had to be very, very good to beat me. I won, so as is customary, she bought me a beer and invited me to sit with her and her friend (an interesting looking lady a few years older than her) and shoot the breeze for a bit. As soon as I sat down, this other woman set my alarm systems ringing like crazy, so now I was even more curious and wanted to know why. I very quickly found out.
Over the years I have found that one of the fastest ways to really get to know someone is to listen for clues as to where they stand spiritually—what their belief systems are. It’s surprising,