Silas
Beloved of All
Thank you for sharing this heavy burden and for caring enough to intercede for your friend. I join you in praying for his complete deliverance and restoration.
Heroin is a terribly powerful enslaver. It offers an intense and fleeting euphoria that grips the body and mind so strongly that even a very brief exposure can create addiction, and once that bondage takes hold it tends to drag a person down to the very bottom. It is part of that lure of the flesh that promises pleasure but in the end steals health, integrity, relationships and hope. The lying, theft and extortion you describe do not excuse the behavior, but they show how deep the trap has become and how the addiction now drives him to do things he would otherwise never do.
That is why our hope cannot rest in repeated attempts at rehab alone, as helpful as honest help can be, but in the power of Jesus Christ to set free. Scripture shows us that God often allows His people to come to a place where there seems to be no way out, so that He can make a way where there is no way and manifest His delivering power. When Israel stood before the sea with no escape, God opened the sea and then they sang the song of Moses, a song of praise for His glorious triumph and deliverance. That same God still delivers today, and the song of the Lamb is the song of redemption and deliverance from the power of darkness through Jesus Christ.
The work of Jesus is always restoration. Years of sin can take a severe toll on a body, on a mind, on a family and on trust, and people around may even conclude that a life is ruined beyond repair. Yet God specializes in restoring what the enemy has torn down. He can restore sanity, health, relationships and honesty, and put a life back together again. Even when discipline or consequences are necessary, the heart of the Lord and the heart of His people toward a brother in sin is always restoration, to seek and to save that which is lost and to help bring him back.
So I am praying with you that God will break the power of this addiction in your friend's life, that he will turn fully to Jesus in repentance and faith and receive both forgiveness and power to walk free, that the Holy Spirit will give him a hatred for the drug and for the deceit that has accompanied it, and a willingness to make things right where he has stolen and lied and taken money wrongly. I pray that God will surround him with wise, godly accountability, sound counsel and real help, and that God will restore to him and to those he has hurt what has been lost in these years, for His glory.
We will continue to hold him before the Lord, asking for true victory not just for a season but for a lifetime, through the grace and keeping power of Jesus Christ.
Heroin is a terribly powerful enslaver. It offers an intense and fleeting euphoria that grips the body and mind so strongly that even a very brief exposure can create addiction, and once that bondage takes hold it tends to drag a person down to the very bottom. It is part of that lure of the flesh that promises pleasure but in the end steals health, integrity, relationships and hope. The lying, theft and extortion you describe do not excuse the behavior, but they show how deep the trap has become and how the addiction now drives him to do things he would otherwise never do.
That is why our hope cannot rest in repeated attempts at rehab alone, as helpful as honest help can be, but in the power of Jesus Christ to set free. Scripture shows us that God often allows His people to come to a place where there seems to be no way out, so that He can make a way where there is no way and manifest His delivering power. When Israel stood before the sea with no escape, God opened the sea and then they sang the song of Moses, a song of praise for His glorious triumph and deliverance. That same God still delivers today, and the song of the Lamb is the song of redemption and deliverance from the power of darkness through Jesus Christ.
The work of Jesus is always restoration. Years of sin can take a severe toll on a body, on a mind, on a family and on trust, and people around may even conclude that a life is ruined beyond repair. Yet God specializes in restoring what the enemy has torn down. He can restore sanity, health, relationships and honesty, and put a life back together again. Even when discipline or consequences are necessary, the heart of the Lord and the heart of His people toward a brother in sin is always restoration, to seek and to save that which is lost and to help bring him back.
So I am praying with you that God will break the power of this addiction in your friend's life, that he will turn fully to Jesus in repentance and faith and receive both forgiveness and power to walk free, that the Holy Spirit will give him a hatred for the drug and for the deceit that has accompanied it, and a willingness to make things right where he has stolen and lied and taken money wrongly. I pray that God will surround him with wise, godly accountability, sound counsel and real help, and that God will restore to him and to those he has hurt what has been lost in these years, for His glory.
We will continue to hold him before the Lord, asking for true victory not just for a season but for a lifetime, through the grace and keeping power of Jesus Christ.
