Psalm 13 (NIV) - day after day, sorrow in my heart, But I trust in your unfailing love

From Psalms

Psalm 13 (New International Version, ©2011)
(For the director of music. A psalm of David.)

¹How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever?
     How long will you hide your face from me?
²How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
     and day after day have sorrow in my heart?
     How long will my enemy triumph over me?

³Look on me and answer, LORD my God.
     Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death,
⁴and my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”
     and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

⁵But I trust in your unfailing love;
     my heart rejoices in your salvation.
⁶I will sing the LORD’s praise,
     for he has been good to me.

I like this Psalm 13 - inauspicious as the number be - the Psalm is short and sweet and authentic.  Everyday we face different struggles and challenges, new urges and temptations, heightened problems and issues.  Our addictions never go away or worse they are progessive and pull us away from the people we love and the life we want to live.

So where is God in all of this?  I believe in a God that allows for something good to come of every situation - especially the difficult situations.  That's not to say that bad situations are good - out of bad situations come good.  Out of difficult circumstances comes knowledge, out of trying times comes love, out of dire straits comes strength.  From the old proverb, when we're handed lemons we make lemonade.

In recovery this is easy to say...however, for those still in the struggles of addiction it will be much harder to swallow.  If you're in the middle of a divorce or just lost your job because your addiction took control of your life I can understand that this will be hard to believe.

Nevertheless, let's take it a step further though if I can.  Without lemons there would be no lemonade, so God gives us lemons so that we can make lemonade.  He gives problems to deal with so that we can become stronger.  He gives us challenges that will shape us and change our perspective.  Lemons come in all shapes and sizes if you will - and he gives no more than he thinks we can handle.  However, if you are truly blessed, like I believe I am, then God will give more than your share of lemons - so you will have lemonade to share with others.

Thank you for letting me share.

Psalm 12 (NIV) - Help, LORD, Everyone lies...and harbors deception in their hearts

From Psalms

Psalm 12 (New International Version, ©2011)
For the director of music. According to sheminith (musical term). A psalm of David.

¹Help, LORD, for no one is faithful anymore;
     those who are loyal have vanished from the human race.
²Everyone lies to their neighbor;
     they flatter with their lips
     but harbor deception in their hearts.

³May the LORD silence all flattering lips
     and every boastful tongue—
⁴those who say,
     “By our tongues we will prevail;
     our own lips will defend us—who is lord over us?”

⁵ “Because the poor are plundered and the needy groan,
     I will now arise,” says the LORD.
     “I will protect them from those who malign them.”
⁶And the words of the LORD are flawless,
     like silver purified in a crucible,
     like gold refined seven times.

⁷You, LORD, will keep the needy safe
     and will protect us forever from the wicked,
⁸who freely strut about
     when what is vile is honored by the human race.

I think it's important as much as possible to try and do one psalm every day, despite doing step work.  Now I say that having just taken a much needed vacation with my family which has interrupted my both my written psalms and my online psalms.  So long as there was no acting out or relapse in the addiction I do not see much fault in that.  In any case, there is a lot of work in step work but as much as possible try to keep both step work and psalms going together.

On today's psalm, psalm 12, we see a lot of overlap and consistency with step 1.  As addicts we were dishonest.  As addicts we harbored deception in our hearts.  Thankfully, the LORD says, "I will arise," and he will protect us from ourselves, "from the protect them from those who malign them."  Or perhaps he will also protect us from those who sell us in our addiction.  From the huge corporations that create and market alcohol and sexual pleasure as a pathway to happiness.  I believe it is a combination - through prayer we will find a pathway to what is important and to more meaningful happiness.  Not a happiness that is based on instant gratification.

Thanks for letting me share.

Step 1 - We admitted we were powerless over addiction...pt I

Anyone who has stepped into a meeting knows the power of their addiction and the struggle to fight it. It seems that its only in the most dire circumstances that we admit there's nothing we can do:
- losing a job
- losing a marriage
- getting charged with a crime

There's a little more to step one though. Step one is about putting our addiction on the table, and putting it into the light. It's the first step towards honesty - and the first step towards healing and recovery.

Over the next three days I will list a some exercises and questions that will help with that honesty.  Now these exercises are focused on Sex Addiction because my addiction to the natural endorphines released at orgasm are the substance that I had the most trouble with. Nearly all the books on my books page will also have similar exercises - which will help in being honest with how bad things had gotten.

So, let's start with powerlessness.  This is the urge to act out which takes the seemingly illogical precedence over family, work, safety and health concerns.  The inability to control the type, time, place or circumstances of our sexual behavior.  Promises, to ourselves and to others are broken - all best intentions are thwarted.  To gain a better understanding of how powerless you have become to your sexual behavior here are some behaviors I would like you to cite examples (at least 2 per topic) of: (Find a piece of paper where you can write this down)

Pre-occupation: Thinking about, looking forward to, planning, fantasizing about, setting up, or hiding sexual behavior:  (also determine how much time you spend every week just with preoccupation)

Attempts to Control: Switching Sexual Partners or Behaviors, internet filters, previous treatments, journal, self-imposed celibacy or abstinence, geographic moves.

Destructive Behavior:  Physical injury or risk of physical injury to self or others, diseases or infections, abusive behaviors to others, destroyed relationships, money spent on sex when it was needed for rent or food.

Progression of disease: Masturbation to porn to strip clubs to webcams; or cruising to paid sex to public anonymous sex.

This is the first exercise of step 1.  We will start to drill into each of these areas and explore more as we expose how bad our disease had really gotten over the next few days.  This honesty, in no way, will be easy.  However, it is necessary for recovery.

Thanks for letting me share.

Psalm 11 (NIV) - He hates the wicked who love violence (and pornography)

From Psalms

Psalm 11 (New International Version, ©2011)
(For the director of music. Of David.)

¹In the LORD I take refuge.
     How then can you say to me:
     “Flee like a bird to your mountain.
²For look, the wicked bend their bows;
     they set their arrows against the strings
to shoot from the shadows
     at the upright in heart.
³When the foundations are being destroyed,
     what can the righteous do?”

⁴The LORD is in his holy temple;
     the LORD is on his heavenly throne.
He observes everyone on earth;
     his eyes examine them.
⁵The LORD examines the righteous,
     but the wicked, those who love violence,
     he hates with a passion.
⁶On the wicked he will rain
     fiery coals and burning sulfur;
     a scorching wind will be their lot.

⁷For the LORD is righteous,
     he loves justice;
     the upright will see his face.

Notice how I added "pornography" to the list of the things that wicked people love.  When I re-wrote this Psalm.  I must have been in a focused mood that day - porn was the enemy.  However, God was on my side, so whom then shall I fear?  For God will destroy evil.

Which leads me to another concept I'd like to discuss.  As we grow and mature spiritually God helps us destroy the wicked and evil part (or parts) of us - the selfish, impatient, uncaring person - the addict if you will.  As he does he helps us replace it with a stronger, giving, caring, selfless, kind, and patient person.  This growth and change is slow and painful.  For there is no growth without change, and no change without loss, and no loss without pain.  But we know that this change is absolutely necessary because of the dire circumstances we found ourselves in as an addict is not the life we want any longer.

But there is hope because the hope of the afflicted will never perish.  If God has seen us through 11 days of Psalms and another day of sobriety.  With every day of sobriety there is more strength and more light and more hope.  We will prevail over our addiction.

Thank you for letting me share.

Psalm 10 (NIV) - In all his thoughts there is no room for God

From Psalms

Psalm 10 (New International Version, ©2011)

¹Why, LORD, do you stand far off?
     Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?

²In his arrogance the wicked man hunts down the weak,
     who are caught in the schemes he devises.
³He boasts about the cravings of his heart;
     he blesses the greedy and reviles the LORD.
⁴In his pride the wicked man does not seek him;
     in all his thoughts there is no room for God.
⁵His ways are always prosperous;
     your laws are rejected by him;
     he sneers at all his enemies.
⁶He says to himself, “Nothing will ever shake me.”
     He swears, “No one will ever do me harm.”

⁷His mouth is full of lies and threats;
     trouble and evil are under his tongue.
⁸He lies in wait near the villages;
     from ambush he murders the innocent.
His eyes watch in secret for his victims;
⁹like a lion in cover he lies in wait.
He lies in wait to catch the helpless;
     he catches the helpless and drags them off in his net.
¹⁰His victims are crushed, they collapse;
     they fall under his strength.
¹¹He says to himself, “God will never notice;
     he covers his face and never sees.”

¹²Arise, LORD! Lift up your hand, O God.
     Do not forget the helpless.
¹³Why does the wicked man revile God?
     Why does he say to himself,
     “He won’t call me to account”?
¹⁴But you, God, see the trouble of the afflicted;
     you consider their grief and take it in hand.
The victims commit themselves to you;
     you are the helper of the fatherless.
¹⁵Break the arm of the wicked man;
     call the evildoer to account for his wickedness
     that would not otherwise be found out.

¹⁶The LORD is King for ever and ever;
     the nations will perish from his land.
¹⁷You, LORD, hear the desire of the afflicted;
     you encourage them, and you listen to their cry,
¹⁸defending the fatherless and the oppressed,
     so that mere earthly mortals
     will never again strike terror.

Wow - there's a lot of great things here. Where do I begin?  Let's start with verse 4 - "in all his thoughts there is no room for God."  This is another part of what I have learned during recovery.  I now know that I did not have room for God in my thoughts.  However, as I started to rewrite the Psalms I lost room in my thoughts for my addiction.  As I worked through the 12 steps I made room for God, too, and lost room for my addictions.  These are habits that needs to be practiced and repeated.  After years of drinking and acting out sexually for hours every day I had some deep rooted habits.  It will probably take years reading the Bible and working the steps for hours every to replace my old habits with my new habits.

There are two other parts of this Psalm I want to look at quickly.  "God will never notice," and, "Call the evildoer to account for his wickedness."  As addicts, we say things, "We're not hurting anyone," ""Nobody will ever know the difference," or "Everybody does it."  In saying these things we are saying, "God will never notice."  However, in recovery we learn God was watching.  Inevitably, God puts us in a situation where we are taken to account, when we hit "rock bottom."  It's at this point we have to choose between being saved by him or losing everything we have in life.  My hope is that you choose to open your heart to God and recovery instead of losing everything.

With that, I would like to close with a thought of hope.  Verse 17, "You, LORD, hear the desire of the afflicted; you encourage them, and you listen to their cry."  We the afflicted, the addicted, the alcoholics, God hears our cry.  Listen to the Holy Spirit for his encouragement.  We will prevail over the chains of alcohol.  We will prevail over the prison of our sexual addictions.

Thanks for letting me share.