The Enemy Wants Your Soul

Addiction is a spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical warfare. Are you able to engage in the battle alone without armor and weapons?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

I'm here to help. If you're in search of help to try to get your life back together, join me here at DocShock, your addiction lifeguard, the addiction recovery podcast. to be real clear about what this podcast is intended for. It is intended for entertainment and informational purposes, but not considered help. If you actually need real help and you're in need of help, please seek that out. If you're in dire need of help, you can go to your nearest emergency room or you can check into a rehab center or call a counselor like me and talk about your problems and work through them. But don't rely on a podcast to be that form of help. It's not. It's just a When I'm dealing with somebody who's got addiction, what I'm dealing with is a problem of a conflict. It's a battle. It's a warfare that they're engaged in. But they have become the target by other people and themselves. So the battle that's occurring, unfortunately, is with an enemy that is very sneaky and very deceptive. And it disguises itself and is hidden. So when an addict is expressing outrage or upset about life or other people and the people around them are upset and raging against the addiction what they're doing is they're coming after the addict and there's a lot of blaming there's a lot of confrontation it's a pretty messy battle the part that's missing is that you're not really engaging with an addict you're engaging with addiction but addiction is sneaky and it can hide and it does it hides very well it disguises itself and it It fades into the background so that it's hidden. So what happens invariably is everybody's running around upset and there's lots of chaos and blame storming and all kinds of stuff goes on. The battle is with addiction. It's not with the addict. The addict is not the problem. The addict has a problem and the problem is the problem. But addiction... is the disease that they're using to cope with the problem it's a faulty coping mechanism so the idea that that you're dealing with addiction means to most people that they're dealing with the addict the addict is the victim and the people around them are the victims they're being attacked by this wily crafty chameleon-like attacker that comes in the form of addiction The enemy is striking against you. And so when you begin to work on addiction, you have to separate yourself from the attacker. That's kind of challenging to do because addiction causes you to be very destructive. And anybody who has addiction understands what I'm talking about. Destroys families, friends, relationships, freedom, health, financial success, failure of that, everything, housing. It attacks everything. Right. Because eventually what it wants to do is kill you, but it's going to strip everything away from you. And in the process, it will pit your family members and your friends, your loved ones against you, the addict and the addict against them. So the old saying of the enemy of my enemy is my friend. So addiction gets allies. And what it does is it starts to invade all these relationships and cause all this destruction.

UNKNOWN: 4:22

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 4:23

The problem that most people have is they don't understand they're up against an enemy, and so they're not prepared for that battle, and they have no protection. There are no weapons that they're using. You can go to rehab. You can start working a program. You can go into the rooms, into meetings, and participate in those kinds of things. But until you really understand who the enemy is, you're shooting in the air. You're swinging at nothing. You're shadowboxing, if you will. So I think what I'd like to... work on today is an understanding of what is the enemy, who is the enemy, and what do you do about dealing with the enemy. And I think the idea that you are in a battle by yourself is a false idea. You're not. But there are lots of ways of interpreting and understanding the enemy, but from a scriptural standpoint, The description of be sober and watchful because your adversary, the devil, walks around as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. That's in 1 Peter 5, 8. The idea of the enemy is being sober and watchful, right? The enemy is not an addict itself, right? It is the tool that the enemy is using. Addiction is the tool that the enemy is using to come after you. The enemy is sober and watchful. It's waiting. It's waiting to attack. We talk about in recovery that, hey, you know what? You think you may be safe from addiction, but while you're in the rooms here and we're talking, but you know what? Addiction is out in the parking lot doing push-ups and exercising, getting stronger. It's being watchful, and it's going to be around as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. That's true. Addiction is funny. It works on its strength, right, because it's got to have that strength. So trying to figure out how to battle an enemy is great, but if you don't even know who the enemy is, you can't identify it, you're not going to be battling against anything. To understand the enemy is to understand how you deal with the battle. So I like to think of addiction as the enemy. It's the tool that the enemy is using, if you will. Also, you could look at it either way. But it's the enemy. So you attack... And, you know, we have a lot of sayings in recovery. One of them is individuals don't get sober or clean. Groups do. So if your group includes family members or loved ones, that's fine. If it's if you don't have any of those that, you know, some of us don't have families, then you're you're friends.

UNKNOWN: 7:21

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 7:22

And if you have a few of those left because they've either died from their addiction or they are addicts engaged in addiction and they're not really, you know, those are the friends you have, then you go into the rooms and you get a new group of friends, right? You get sober friends and people that are allies in that fight against the enemy. And when you get those people around you, that's when you start to battle because there's strength in numbers, right? But what's interesting is one of my sayings, isolation is addiction's best friend. And so what addiction wants you to do is get isolated, right? Subtract all the people that can help you, all the resources that can fight against addiction. Addiction will isolate you. You isolate your opponent, right? from all its support, all its allies, it's sure to fall. And so it's kind of like the Cubans. The United States has tried to use that as a means to force Cuba into overthrowing its communist government. Unfortunately, it's not working. It hasn't worked so far. But, I mean, that's the idea, right? To isolate. Every war that we've had, we try to cut off the allies of the enemy because it makes the enemy, you know, weaker. So, in the instance of addiction, you know, it's the lion that's going to come roaring forward and devour you. And if it's roaring in the distance, it's coming for you. If it's out in the parking lot and doing exercises, pushups waiting for you, it's going to come back. And if you are in any way in the process of recovery, you know exactly what I'm talking about because the fight that you've seen other people engage in and perhaps lose that fight, they go back out, they overdose, they stop their recovery, you know, all along the way, you're seeing it. So how do you fight addiction? Well, you have to identify it as the enemy first because you want to see that the lion is the enemy, right? It's coming to get you. And so when you're prepared for that, what you have to have is you have to have strength. You have to have the training, the understanding, the strategy. And again, another scriptural reference to this is, Ephesians 6.11, but the armor of God statements. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. The armor of God. You know, the idea that you were protected. You have to have that armor. You're not just going to automatically have it. You have to go seek it out. And I know there's scriptural references to what that armor is and protecting yourself in the spiritual warfare that goes on. But I would rather for this podcast talk about the idea of what the armor of God could be provided to you. Where do you get that? Not necessarily what it is, but where do you get it? Well, you get it from your faith. But if you don't have any faith in anything, you don't believe in anything, you don't believe that there's anything that can help you, you're not going to select anything for armor. There is no armor. Going into the rooms, getting the camaraderie of the people that are in that struggle too. You shouldn't fight the enemy by yourself. Fight it with other people. The people that care about you. So that you can stand against, and it's interesting, the schemes of the devil. I know there's many versions of the Bible. That's from the modern English version. But the schemes of the devil are For the fight is not against the flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of the world, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. It is a spiritual warfare that's going on. It is a physical warfare that's going on. It's a mental warfare that's going on. The enemy has many weapons to use against you. And if you only have one weapon, source of protection and the enemy defeats that there is nothing left you are left wide open for and vulnerable for attack so it's important that you have a process and a system and a and a resource in place for every possible thing so when people come to see me in my practice and and i talk to them about recovery It is like the first questions I'm asking them is like, well, what else are you doing? I mean, you came here, but there's 168 hours in a week. So this is one. What about the other 167 hours? What are you doing? And most times I hear, I don't know, nothing. Well, I have a book I'm reading. Well, are you really reading that book? And that's it? Like you don't have people? And they don't. They don't have people. They don't have a crowd around them. They don't have the resources for that. They haven't engaged in that part of it. But that's a very important part of it. Because the enemy is crafty and it has weapons. It has multiple weapons. So you have to have the support around you. Because again, I think it's a three-pronged attack. It's spiritual, it's mental, and it's physical. And if you can... know destroy one of those things the other two will fall shortly after you know your health you start getting hep c and your jaundiced you know or your intestinal tract starts failing because of all the alcohol you're consuming so you've got ulcers and you're bleeding out or whatever it is right you fall and you get a traumatic brain injury now you're in the icu in the hospital clinging to life because you were drunk and you fell off the balcony or you fell on the hit the curb in the parking lot So how long is it going to take before the rest of your fight gives up because you don't have any other weapons against the enemy? So if it's a physical warfare, your body is going to shut down. That's usually at the end stages of alcohol, unless you're one of the unfortunate ones who will consume a large amount of alcohol or drugs and you overdose. You go into respiratory arrest or your heart just stops. Or you have multiple strokes caused by drugs you're using, which happens. And now your brain is fried. So there are many things physically that can happen to you. It's not just one of incarceration. So you're trapped, you're arrested, you're thrown in jail. It can be beyond that. That's a physical thing. imprisonment but that's not physical harm necessarily but it's the medical problems so you've got that so you know you're at risk for that but it's the spiritual and the emotional the mental warfare that goes on that really causes the problems if somebody has a physical problem it's pretty obvious they got the physical problem so they have a stroke or they have brain damage or physical damage because they got in a DUI or whatever well that's going to be very limiting And those are sad stories, no doubt. But it's the spiritual warfare and the emotional mental warfare. The arrogance that you have in addiction is it's everybody else's problem. That's part of the spiritual warfare. That's the arrogance that addiction has handed you. I don't have a problem. You got the problem. Well, no, actually addiction is working through you to hand you arrogance to use as a shield because that's addiction's weapon that it's handed you as the addict to use. So it's giving you a weapon to use against those who would like to help you. Your arrogance. And I always say that arrogance is very strong and addicts, but it's also the one weapon that's the last one to be put down by the addict. The arrogance. There are times when people come into my office and they sit in the chair across from me and they're so full of arrogance. And they're telling me about how everything's fine. It's everybody else's perception of them being a problem, but they've got it going on. Everything's handled. And They don't quite understand why everybody's upset about whatever it is they're using. And the biggest problem is that they're blinded by their arrogance. And arrogance is something that is not going to go away easily. Because it works. And so it allows you to have that distance between you and everybody else. So if the enemy has handed you arrogance and it's a very effective weapon, you know what? When you put your arrogance down and you start to accept that you are flawed, you accept the problems of what you're going through, you accept responsibility for things, the arrogance starts to go away. It's not everybody else's problem. It is your problem. It is a problem of you doing things that are destructive. Imagine that, you know, like you're trying to fight a fight and the enemy hands you a weapon and then you turn it on yourself. It's crazy. Why would you do that? It makes no sense. And then you have allies that are trying to help you and the enemy has handed you a weapon. You accepted it and you start firing upon the people that are trying to help you. So you're destroying your allies. That's crazy. That's friendly fire. Why would you do that? Well, because you're blinded by arrogance. We all have flaws. We all have those flaws. But the phrase, the armor of God, is one where you are given protections against the enemy. The fight is not against the flesh and blood. but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness, against spiritual forces of evil. That's what it's against. And when you have a spiritual warfare, you have an emotional warfare, you have a mental warfare, you need help with that. So that's why I'm urging you to seek that help out and join in on that fight. Don't become part of the band of the enemy that's trying to slay everybody around you, that's trying to help you. So you've got to seek out that help, and you do it in the rooms. So you go into the rooms, get a sponsor, get friends that are working on recovery, go to Smart Recovery, go into any form of a group. that's working on recovery. Literally. Any form of group. And you will find allies that have been deceived by the enemy. That breaks that cycle of having that warfare that's involving the principalities and the powers and the rulers of darkness. It's that spiritual warfare. The spiritual forces of evil are out to get you. The... The thing that I think of every time I say that or hear that, it always makes me laugh because I think about my son reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid. And there's a passage in one of the books where there's this house that's dark and forbidding and there's a forest area around it. And they're walking through the forest and they're scared because it's at night. And these weird kids that live in that house, they are varying ages. And one of them is trying to scare them out of the woods to get away from the house. And he's yelling at them that his brother, Meckley, you better watch out. Meckley's going to get you. And I always think of that. Meckley's going to get you. And they are terrified. So they run out of the woods. And that's kind of what that spiritual warfare is like. Addiction's going to get you. And so run.

UNKNOWN: 19:58

Run.

SPEAKER_00: 19:58

Run quickly for freedom. And where do they go? When they're in the book, he runs home. He's got to get home. He's trying to get home. He's trying to take a shortcut through the woods. But Meckley's going to get you. So it's that fight. It's that fight where you're trying to get free from the enemy. So if the enemy's using... or has handed you the weapon of arrogance, that is a primary one that keeps everybody at bay. And so that spiritual warfare is going to ramp up when that arrogance kicks in. And I'll tell you something, man, there is nothing harder to deal with than an addict who is just in full-blown arrogance. I've seen people that are homeless, they're destitute, and they need no money, barely any clothing, and they're high, or they're drunk all the time. And they're just, it's just, you know, they have a place to stay. They haven't become completely homeless, but they're close. And they look horrible. Tweakers and drunks and, you know, speed freaks and heroin addicts and their skin is all messed up. They stink. They're dirty. And you ask them how they're doing and they're like, I'm fine. It's like, you're not fine. This is way far away from fine. But the arrogance kicks in, and they don't really see that there's an issue. And I've done interventions with people like that. I've done interventions where the person actually in front of me is high or drunk at the time of the intervention. And I'm looking at them, and they know that I'm an expert in the field of recovery. And they look at me, and I say, are you drunk? right now. You're high right now. And they're like, no, I'm not. I'm like, wow, you, who, who do you think you're fooling here? You know, but that's arrogance, right? That's the spiritual warfare. So the, the enemy that the enemy in the darkness with the, the, the, the ruler of darkness, right? It's the ruler of darkness. I heard a guy talking about, um, His understanding of what he was experiencing when he had this moment of clarity in his recovery, where he had this horrible, horrible dream, and he was thrown into hell. And he was there, and he was looking down, and there were all these people that were in this pit, and they were... It was hot and there was fire and there was a pit and he was looking down at them as he was going into this hell that he was sinking into and he saw them and they were all reaching up to him and they were screaming and yelling and he thought they were trying to pull him in. to the pit and as he got closer and closer he heard them and he realized they weren't trying to pull him in they were screaming that they wanted to get out and they wanted him to help them get out of the pit and he was freaked out about it and he realized what hell really was like that nobody wants to be there he thought he always used to think that there were people that actually wanted to be in hell and then when they got there they enjoyed it. And what he experienced in this moment where he was having that revelation of it, that it's not a place that anybody wants to be. Well, that's what the spiritual warfare is about. That enemy wants to take you there, right? And like I said, it's going to take everything away from you. So you have to have... the tools and the resources to be able to fight against that. And that's where it's a spiritual warfare. It's a mental warfare. It's an emotional warfare. It is a physical warfare. And the enemy wants to take you down. And so having the full armor of God, those pieces that will protect you and that you can use. But in order to pick up one weapon, you have to put another one down. So the enemy wants you to hang on to that arrogance and hang on to those tools. And that's not how you win. So be understanding of yourself and that there is that warfare that goes on. But be sober and watchful. Sober and watchful. Because your adversary, the devil, walks around as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. Think about that. That's what addiction is. Addiction is the enemy. It's the adversary that walks around as a roaring lion wanting to take you out. Fight against that and don't ever quit. I hope you've enjoyed this episode of Doc Jacques, Your Addiction Lifeguard. I'm Dr. Jacques de Bruker, a licensed professional counselor and addiction specialist. If you need help, you can reach out to me through my website, wellspringmindbody.com, and get the help that you need. I'll give you answers, I'll give you suggestions, and if you just need help clinically, I can do that too. So reach out to me, because, you know, listen, addiction wants you, it's going to kill you. It I want you to die. It's not worth saving your addiction by ending your life. That's insane. So, please, go get the help. Go to rehab. Go to the rooms. Do something. Don't be just wobbling your addiction. So, until the next episode of Dog Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard, like and suggest. And I'll see you next time.

UNKNOWN: 25:43

Bye.