Help in overcoming smoking
Question:
Pray that God would continue to help me battle smoking. I go days without it, thinking I am finally free, and then bam I fall flat on my face. I cannot tell you how hard this addiction has been!
Answer:
All addictions are difficult, including smoking. But unless you strive against it, there is no breaking it. The only ones I ever see be fully successful in conquering addictions are those who quit cold turkey and determined that their life was not going to be dictated to them by some chemical. When I was a teen there was a goodly Christian woman whom I knew. We were over one day at her house for dinner and she said she had to explain something that we might see and wonder about. There was an unopened pack of cigarettes on her dresser in her bedroom. She said she used to be a smoker, but eleven years ago she ran out of cigarettes. There was a thunderstorm that night and it was pouring down rain, but she got out and walk to the corner station to get more cigarettes. Then it hit how ridiculous it was that she "had" to go out in a storm for something as worthless as a pack of cigarettes. Then she thought about the verses, "Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one's slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness?" (Romans 6:16) and "All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any" (I Corinthians 6:12). She decided then and there that she wasn't going to let a rolled up piece of a plant run her life. When she came home, she plopped the pack down on her dresser and never touched another cigarette in her life. She left the pack there to remind herself of her commitment.
