Many people knock on a counselor’s door seeking help because the compulsion is destroying them and their lives. When hearing the word, most people think of drugs or alcohol being used excessively and out of control. The use of pornography is also often included in such a list.

Those words are accurate descriptions. However, I would want us to look more deeply into the word addiction and broaden our thinking about what it is and how we, as human beings, are often controlled and even destroyed by things we cannot manage, change, or stop. We destroy others as well. Let’s look at some synonyms for addiction. The word can also mean bent or dependence. It can mean enslavement or fixation. That means someone with a bent toward cruelty, verbal or physical, is destructive and out of control. Like substances, those actions are damaging, crushing, and dehumanizing not just to the one doing so, but also to the recipients. Pride, self-aggrandizing, and an abuse of power destroy both self and others and easily become an engrained pattern with no stop button. Nor, like addicts of a substance, do they seem to be self-aware of the hideous damage—again, not just to others but to themselves. Leaders who lead by abusive behavior are crushing many souls, including their own. Like alcoholics, they minimize what they do, the damage it causes, and their incapacity to manage themselves.

Think with me about domestic violence. Does the abuser truly see the abused and the damage done? They usually say the harm was necessary because the victim did __________ or was __________, and if they had not, it would never have happened. Think about sexual abuse. Does not the same response show up? It was due to the victim’s behavior, their lack of something, or their appearance. The damage done to others is immeasurable, and the given reason for that damage is something in the victim. The self-deception is quite staggering.

Note the following quote: “According to your faithless servant, Voltaire, Louis 14th and de Brinvillers went to confession as soon as they had committed a great crime. They confessed frequently, he said, ‘… as a gourmand takes medicine to increase his appetite’ (a gourmand loves food too much, eats in excess and takes medicine so he can keep eating). I ask you, in light of such cynicism, would it be improper to suggest that a murderer’s confession sometimes serves as a salt to the food of evil?” 

Have we ever really thought of these things as salt for the food of evil? Salt is a preservative. Our excuses, renaming, minimizing, and outright lying of such matters are an active cover-up of life-destroying poison. The poison destroys people our God loves and the places we call His house. We are His house—not a building or system. Jesus said to the leaders in the temple of His day, “… You are experts at setting aside and nullifying the commandment of God to keep your [man-made] tradition…” (Mark 7:9, AMP). We have “salted” many forms of abuse in the name of our God. Like an addict, we are bent toward, enslaved to, and fixated on preserving ourselves, our positions, and our spaces, ignoring the damage to many, including ourselves, and instead maintaining our systems. We have defiled our God’s name and ourselves. 

In assessing ourselves, we need to listen to Jesus’ next word. He said, “Listen to Me… and understand: there is nothing outside the man which can defile him… the things which proceed out of the man are what defile the man” (Mark 7:14-15, NASB1995). He continues and says that from within comes evil thoughts, deceit, sensuality, envy, and pride (21-22). These things come from within—not from our circumstances or others—and defile us. To defile is to pollute, debase, corrupt, and destroy. These are very serious words for us today. Our failure to truly understand these effects and bow before our undefiled Lord is breaking the heart of our Father and destroying many lambs for whom He died.

So what must we do? Like any addict, we must face the truth. There is no recovery without truth. That certainly means speaking the truth with no cover-ups, but it also means bowing before the One who is Truth. Recovery also means return, reconstruction, and restoration. From the very beginning, our God has built His kingdom with human beings who were created in His image and who were to bring His likeness to bear on each other and the world. As a result of our choice of self-rule, we instead live on a ruined planet and, by way of deceit, are creating greater ruin for ourselves and others. Our Lord came in the flesh to rescue us from our slavish addiction to ourselves and has called us to be like Him in this place.

This God we say we worship is light… there is no darkness in Him. Light searches, uncovers, exposes, and brings health. Christ exposes us to ourselves. He shines a light on the rot in our souls yet remains uncorrupted. When He was here in the flesh, He exposed Rome, the political system. He exposed the religious system operating under His name. “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind” (John 1:4, NIV).

We are His children. He loves us. He also calls us to the light—a frightening place but one where He will meet us—with His light, yes, but never without His love. Let that sink in a bit. You will never stand in God’s light without the presence of His love. He will accompany us in that place. He knocks and says, let Me examine you; let Me search your heart and mind together. He longs for us to respond as David did in Psalm 139:1 (ESV), “O Lord, you have searched me and known me!” 

The call to examine ourselves is a call to a duet. It is you and the Father—the Father who is understood in the life of the Word made flesh. That Word is truth, light, infinite love, kindness, and unerring obedience to the Father. He is the One who enables us to see where we are blind, to call things by their proper name, and to know that whatever we find in ourselves, He is still the lover and transformer of our souls.

Diane Langberg, Ph.D., is globally recognized for her 50 years of clinical work with trauma victims. She has trained caregivers on six continents in responding to trauma and the abuse of power. For 29 years, she directed her own practice in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania—Diane Langberg Ph.D. & Associates. Now, in partnership with Dr. Phil Monroe, Langberg, Monroe & Associates continues this work, which includes 17 therapists with multiple specialties. Dr. Langberg is the author of several books, with her newest being Redeeming Power: Understanding Authority and Abuse in the Church and In Our Lives First: Meditations for Counselors, Volume 2. She is the recipient of the Distinguished Alumna Achievements from Taylor University, the AACC Caregiver Award, the Distinguished President’s Award, and the Philadelphia Council of Clergy’s Christian Service Award. Dr. Langberg is married and has two sons and four grandchildren. For more information, visit www.dianelangberg.com.

Endnote

1 Erdrich L. (2009). The last report on the miracles at little no horse : [a novel]. Harper Perennial, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, p. 276.