Maybe It's Not About Me

Maybe It’s Not About Me

Every alcoholic and addict of anything wonders at some point why they have to be afflicted with their struggle, I know I did. On and off throughout my sobriety I have wondered why I can’t be like “Normies” and enjoy a drink or two with a good meal, with friends, when on vacation. It’s frustrating in a deep and visceral way. Your mind screams at you to just be normal and control it. Sometimes my desire to be normal screams so loud it’s all I can hear. Like standing on the edge of a busy highway as the cars fly by. Tire noise, engine noise, air being displaced as they speed by. So is the screaming in my mind sometimes to just be normal. I have cried wondering why, I have screamed wondering why, I have begged God to understand why. Why must I be afflicted with such a curse while so many others can just be normal? Alcohol, drugs, food addiction, sex addiction, TV, social media, things that seem normal to everyone else but are like standing next to the roaring highway for others.

I recently returned from Mexico after my mother-in-law passed away. She suffered for over 25 years with Multiple Sclerosis. For two and a half decades she was completely paralyzed from the neck down. Unable to even scratch an itch. When a position was uncomfortable, she, unlike all of us “normies”, couldn’t move or adjust herself.

I wish I would have known her longer. I only met and saw her a few times before she died. She was an amazing woman. A rich family legacy that had nothing to do with money, but everything to do with four daughters and their families who served and loved God, who loved each other, and opened their arms and hearts to me. Her legacy was a husband who she loved and supported nearly her entire adult life. Her legacy was that she was never depressed, never gave up when she could have. She shared God with her caretakers. Her legacy was a mantra that she lived by every day, “Worship until the morning comes.”

You wanna talk about the right to scream and cry and shout and ask God, “Why am I afflicted?” I have screamed and shouted and cried about not being able to handle whiskey and as I type this on my deck I can scratch when something itches, I can lift my coffee mug to my mouth to take a drink, I can type and my muscles respond to my thoughts in rhythm and with ease. The thought of losing that like Maria Elena did is terrifying. If considering the possibility of that happening doesn’t sound scary, you have a different mental and emotional fortitude than I do.

I would imagine from time to time she did have those thoughts. She did wonder why she was afflicted and perhaps even cursed with MS. Maybe she asked herself what she did to deserve it? Perhaps she asked, “God, did I commit some great sin to deserve this affliction? Did I do something that cursed me with this? Why would You allow this to happen to me?” If anyone had the right to ask that, it would be her.

In the book of John, Jesus and his disciples came upon a man who had been blind from birth. They asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.”

In the case of this blind man, Jesus showed the works and power of God by healing him. In the case of Maria Elena the works and power of God were shown through her life, everyday. God has not removed my alcoholism from me and I will never be able to have a drink like a “normie”. The power and works of God are shown through every moment of redemption in my life. The redemption of my professional life, redemption of being a husband, a friend, a brother and son. The redemption of my service to God in the church and as a worship leader. The redemption of my relationship with Him, my faith, my trust, my hope.

Who sinned that I am afflicted? Of course I have sinned, we all have sinned and fall short, but I am not afflicted because of that. I choose to believe that the glory and power of God is shown through me in my addiction. That if I get to help just one other person struggling, that if I can help one person who feels lost and on the brink of death, then my affliction is worth the struggle. It’s not about why God “cursed me with addiction.” It’s about His glory and power shown through victory over it. The power of His redemption and His healing.

Here’s my challenge: What if your worst day isn’t really about you? What if the worst thing that has ever happened and will ever happen to you, isn’t really about you? What if the deepest, darkest, most painful pit of your existence isn’t about you? What if the darkness being so black and complete it felt like you were going to just blink out of existence, wasn’t really about you?

What if it was so that God’s works and glory would be shown through you like a tall, brilliantly bright, beacon on the hill of someone else’s deepest, darkest valley as they walk in sheer terror and loneliness. What if the most painful and hardest thing you have ever experienced was so that you would be the lighthouse that is seen in the horror of the wind, waves, pounding rain, and impenetrable fog of someone else’s nightmare? What if every tear you cried, every moment of pain, every second of feeling the suffocating feeling of desperation was so that you could reach out and pull someone else from the grips of the hell they are existing in and God’s works and glory could be shown through you?

What if it’s really not about you? What if it’s about Him. Maria Elena wasn’t cursed or punished, SHE. CHANGED. PEOPLE’S. LIVES. She created a legacy that changed people’s lives, that saved people’s hearts. Her legacy will be passed to generation after generation. Her affliction wasn’t about her, it was about what God did THROUGH her.

His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.” John 9 2-3.

And with that, I will take another 24.