Unshackled Moments ~ February 16 ~ Falling Down

Last night as I struggled to slip up on sleep and catch some Zs unaware, Falling Down by David Meece began to play on my Mental Jukebox. It's been 6 years and a month since I began the downward spiral that became my last relapse into drugs and alcohol. It's about  one more month until the six year mark of actually picking up and using, of doing OK at first then losing control again, of losing about 40 lbs and looking like an extra on The Walking Dead. It will be three more months before I celebrate the grace that allowed me to live and break that bondage again. In May of this year, I will have six years clean and sober.

And that's wonderful. In that area of my life I have been blessed with perfection, if you don't start measuring until after my last relapse. If you count my original sobriety date of sometime in the first week of November of 2008 (in which case I should be working on 8 years) I fell short many times. If you start counting at birth my life has been an epic fail But for close to six years now. I have not found it necessary to take anything or drink anything that I wasn't prescribed to by a doctor in six years. But that perfection is not mine. It is God's amazing grace. Still there are areas in my life where I have not achieved perfection in walking free of the bondage from which I have been set free.


In many areas and many times I have returned to my spiritual Egypt. I have failed to walk by the power of the Holy Spirit and therefore I have fulfilled the wishes and desires of my cursed carnal flesh. I am not the reprobate I used to be, but I am nowhere near the man walking with God that I should be, or that I want to be. It's good when people understand falling down and getting back up and that we fail. Christians shouldn't put one another down for messing up, since we all do it, and I am grateful for those with a spirit of grace over condemnation. That said, I know that the less I fall, the more I have victory in my life, the more it shows the world I would help His power, love and way of life.

The grace to overcome is there for me in every area of my life as much as it is with the alcohol and drugs. If I was as afraid of the consequences and desperate to avoid all bondage as much as that one, I would never fall again. But I'm not. That's just honesty. The grace is there to overcome and walk in a new and righteous way. I want that today. There is also grace to get back up. When we remember to allow Him to do the work and stop trying to free ourselves, we can be free in any area, in every area. The forgiveness for the fallen is available, and so is the grace to get back up. But as wonderful as the miracle of grace is to display, I want to bear witness to the God that defeats enemies and gives victory as much as heals wounds from lost wars.

God, I offer myself to Thee — to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life. May I do Thy will always!

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t of despair.