Do you want to get well?

Walking…Talking

This morning

With another Mom that’s been there

Down this road of addiction

Relapse

Recovery

And back again

Round and round we go

Her daughter is doing well

Finally wanted ‘it’ for herself

Not for her family

But for herself

Seems to be the key

To recovery

Do you want to get well…

How bad do you want to get well?

Rehabs

Transitional living

Sober living homes

Coaches, Counselors, Doctors

Sponsors

Meetings

All for naught

If you don’t want to get well

And want it bad

As if your life depended on it

Because it does

It hurts to see him struggle

To try and try again

And fail

Will success ever come?

I want to do it for him

Hover and help my Prodigal ‘see’

What destruction this is doing to his life

And ours

If only he’d listen…

“Do you want to get well?”  John 5:6

A reflection:

I’ve just finished reading Mark Buchanan’s book, “The Rest of God”.  Chapter 10 is titled RESTORE:  Stopping to Become Whole.

As I read through the pages, Mr. Buchanan impressed upon me this question;

“Do you want to get well,” and the role that the answer to that question plays in our healing.  Although the book was written with the concept of rest and restoring your soul by restoring the Sabbath, the prevailing principal of “Do you want to get well” remains heavy on my heart as I ponder any illness or disease… whether or not choice appears to play a role. 

With addiction, choice is evident on so many levels.  But the question Jesus asked hundreds of years ago is still valid…and necessary today.  “Do you want to get well?”

The author goes on to speculate that, “…perhaps they have come to love their illness.  Sickness can actually steal the place of God.  It can become the sick person’s center, the touchstone by which he defines himself.  Illness is a tyrant with huge territorial ambitions.  It is a seductress with large designs.  It wants not only the sick person’s body.  It wants his heart and mind also.  It wants to be his all-consuming passion."

As I read I realize that my Prodigal’s seductress is the drug…the devil... who has masterminded his way into the disguise of a little white pill.  That holds the power to kill and destroy.  To take hold of a life…my Prodigal’s life…and control with authority, his soul…his center.

So my prayer turns from one of, “God…PLEASE heal my son,” to “God…PLEASE help my son to want to get well.  Deliver him from this all-consuming seductress that wages war over his soul….Deliver him from evil and touch his heart with your love and give him hope that there can be victory….if he wants to get well.”