Leaving the Pit
It was the most compelling argument I've ever heard against social drinking...
A young man in his 30s stood in front of the Leaving the Pit Conference in Indianapolis on Saturday and told his story. His alcohol use began in high school and intensified in college. He hid it well. He was drinking heavily even though he was actively involved in church activities. "Knowledge was not my problem; connecting my heart to my head was my problem."
He shrugged off his first DUI. As he sat in a jail cell following his second DUI, he looked around at other prisoners a decade his senior and asked, "Is this where I want to be in ten years?" It was decision time.
Today, he is ten years sober, married, and a father. As he told his powerful story, the silence was deafening. And then he said...
"I go to an AA meeting where people confess their struggles and where it is acknowledged openly that we cannot place ourselves in any situation where we could be tempted to drink -- and then ... I sit in a Bible class and hear a brother in Christ make a comment that he doesn't see anything wrong with social drinking and I just shake my head ..."
Sadly, alcohol is the leading drug of choice for many. Make no mistake: it is a drug -- albeit bottled. Its force is powerful, addictive, and life-changing. And someone dares encourage its recreational use?
"Am I my brother's keeper?" Yes, I am.
P.S. Want to know more about Leaving The Pit monthly conferences? Visit leavingthepit.com. Highly recommended.
"But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day would overtake you like a thief; for you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness; so then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober. For those who sleep do their sleeping at night, and those who get drunk get drunk at night. But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation." (I Thessalonians 5:4-8).