I was about 12 years old when I found a pack of cigarettes on the side of the road. That’s when I tried them for the first time. What a mistake! It was about the same time I was introduced to Sharon, the youth leader at the church we had just started to attend. She treated the 7 of us in the youth group like her own kids, taking us out on birthdays, on trips and to retreats. It was at a summer Bible Camp that I first learned that there was a purpose for my life. It came from God! After all, He made me, so who would know better then Him, what that purpose was? So I accepted Him into my life.
That was fine for about 3 years, until I started hanging out with a bunch of so-called friends in high school. We drank and smoked dope together. I was sort of an introvert and these things gave me the confidence I thought I needed. For the next 4 years it became everything in my life. I still did fairly well in school, and played on most of the school teams, but I was becoming an alcoholic and a drug addict and I didn’t even know it.
After completing school and a couple of years in the work force I was getting tired of the same old life style. I started drinking more as a way to soothe the pain. There was a void in my life. When you’re frustrated and angry you look for a way out, and I thought drinking and doing drugs would do that. It didn’t.
I did eventually graduate and I had some good jobs. I was living with my fiancée and I had fulfilled most of my boyhood dreams (to get a good job, a car, a house and a girlfriend). I knew I was a very fortunate and blessed individual. Then slowly it started: I lost jobs due to my drinking, I got pulled over and lost my license for impaired driving, and my relationship with my fiancée and my family were deteriorating. Eventually I allowed cocaine to become a part of my life, and that led to even more problems. I started to hate everything I was doing, and the person I had become.
Then it happened; my fiancée had enough and she gave me an ultimatum. I would have to decide between her and her son or the drinking and the drugs. I told her I wanted her and her son and I wanted everything to work out. Unfortunately I couldn’t quit drinking no matter how hard I tried. She kicked me out. What followed was a restlessness and a discontentment in the center of my being that I couldn’t ignore. I had always taken pride in being a self-made man, “Oh look what I’ve done", or “look what I can do". I was used to being in control of my life. Well I didn’t have control anymore, and I didn’t know how to handle it. I was also afraid of what my friends would think. I was at the bottom of the barrel.
Up until this time I had always been a regular blood donor, until one day they told me I couldn’t give any more because I was diagnosed with Hepatitis C. It was yet another result of my drug habit, and yet I continued to drink and do drugs, not realizing how much it was affecting my health.
My brother, having lived in a world of despair and problems of his own, heard of a drug and alcohol rehabilitation program called Teen Challenge. He went through the program himself and during that year I listened to him over and over again tell me about how I needed God to help me and how much God loved me even though I did the things I did. I knew all this from that camp I went to when I was a kid, yet I was still in denial. “I don’t have a drinking problem; I can quit whenever I want." After 3 or 4 letters, a visit home and I am sure a lot of prayer from different people, I realized my brother had changed. It was then that I knew I wanted what he had. I needed that love, joy, peace, and gentleness in my life.
One day my dad came with me to an appointment with my doctor. I still remember the look of anguish on my dads face and the tears welling up inside him when the specialist told me that I wouldn’t make it to my next appointment. “Steve you’re killing yourself." After drinking and doing drugs for 20 years, along with the effects of Hepatits C, my liver was destroyed. I was jaundiced and I was dying. I said to myself, “I can’t do this to my family." Suddenly, it was as if the scales were removed from my eyes. I found the true gardener. The seed that had been planted 25 years earlier by my youth leader Sharon, was starting to show some life. Only by the grace of almighty God did He break the chains that were binding me down.
I rededicated my life to the Lord at my Mom and Dads. I told them about my plans to go to Teen Challenge. At first I was worried that I would have to give up too much. But I knew in my heart that I had no choice but to surrender my life to Jesus.
I entered the Teen Challenge Program in Winnipeg. The first night, they prayed for deliverance of the drug and alcohol addictions. When I woke up, the craving to smoke and the desire to drink were gone. It was like a switch was turned off. I couldn’t explain it! I had to ask the guys where the cravings had gone because I didn’t understand. I had tried so many times to quit on my own, but it had never worked. But that night, my Jesus took them from me and for me. Praise God! Since that day I have never been the same and I’ve never looked back. God has had a positive impact in every area of my life. He has taken away my anger and bitterness. He has filled that void in my life with His Spirit. Others have prayed for me and now my liver is fine and my health is good. The great physician has healed me.
I had a tendency to continually take the steering wheel of my life. Now I’m glad to sit in the passenger seat and let Christ lead me in the direction He always wanted me to go. He has proven Himself to me over the past couple of years with His faithfulness. The inner quietness, contentment and peace I experience on a daily basis assures me that His promise to love and care for me is so real and true.
