Page 100 - Overcoming Addiction

Chapter 15 - The Weapons of Our Warfare

e have learned much about God’s provision for men and women to overcome
Waddiction as we have observed the history of Israel. The Israelites were
enslaved to the most powerful kingdom on earth. In the same way, we have seen
that all mankind are born as slaves to sin, and are under the power of Satan.

John 8:34
Yahshua answered them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits
sin is the slave of sin.”

As Israel dwelt in Egypt for 430 years they were totally dominated by the
power of Pharaoh and his armies. We read of no revolts, and no open warfare
against Israel’s captors. There were no weapons and no armor to be found among
those who were enslaved. Neither were there any among them who were skilled in
the ways of battle.
While we are slaves to sin, and prior to our release from captivity, we also
lack spiritual armor and weapons, and we have no knowledge of their usage. We
must be instructed in the ways of spiritual warfare, and we must exercise
ourselves in battle in order to become skillful and victorious. If you would go forth
to slay giants, to attack fortified cities, and to demolish strongholds, you must
know something of the weapons of your warfare.
We have seen that our battle is not against flesh and blood, that is to say, it is
not against a physical foe after the manner that Israel fought in the Old
Testament. Our enemies are thoughts, passions, desires, and spiritual forces of
wickedness that assert themselves in defiance of the will of God. In order to face
such foes we must have armor and weapons appropriate for our warfare.

II Corinthians 10:4
For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful...

You will not overcome addiction through any carnal instrument, or human
method. You need that which is divinely powerful. The world thinks it can cure
addiction through pills. A sister in Christ recently sent me an article from
Newsweek on the topic of alcohol and drug addiction which included the following
statements.

If you weigh advances in neuroscience over the last few decades against
social and spiritual progress, it's clear which field is more likely to
produce the next breakthrough in treatments...

To the extent that "willpower" is a meaningful concept at all, the era of
willpower-in-a-pill may be just over the horizon...

"The idea that we can restore 'self-control' or 'free will' with medication is
a very, very exciting one," says Vocci of NIDA. "It could be paradigm
shifting. But we need more studies to see how consistently that impacts
recovery."