The cure for addiction is promised by God for those who believe in His ways and continually admit and confess to Him, their own ways that fall short of His glory.
If we confess our sin, he is faithfull and just to forgive us our sin and will cleanse us from all unrighteousness
1 John 1:9
Tried That, it didn’t work.
Did Jesus not forgive and cleanse you, or, did you return to your addiction and quit confessing? Jesus makes good on His promises. No matter how short our time of reception, Jesus grants forgiveness, cleansing, and healing to those who side with Him and confess their sin to Him, every time.
Do you confess to Jesus during, and after the act every time? What can you lose by continuing confession to Jesus after failure? Your addiction.
Seventy-seven times
Engrain the words “seventy-seven times” (Mt 18:22) in your heart so much that every time you fail, you remember Jesus’ willingness to forgive and heal you.
Jesus taught us, his followers, to forgive one another 77 (unlimited) times every day. He will do much more for us when we confess our sin to Him. Though we may fall back many times a day, each time we turn back to believing God and confess our sin to Him, He forgives, cleanses, and heals us. Each time, our confession becomes more true; the healing – deeper; the temptation – less effective; the cure – more complete; re-occurrence – becomes less; and finally, the full cure – is accomplished.
Each time we confess, God’s promise to forgive and cleanse us is complete on His end, and at work on our end, providing faith, hope, and love which enables us to receive His completed cure.
Within the words ‘forgive’ and ‘cleanse’, Jesus offers us a miraculous work of healing from addiction and every other kind of disease.
Take these three simple steps and find yourself being changed by God.
Perhaps you already have stepped here to some degree. But with God, there is always more to be found.
1. Believe God.
Make the decision to believe that God is completely right in every way. Believe that He came to us in the form of Jesus Christ to give us His way, truth, and life; to pay the penalty for sin; and to set us free from the addiction curse that sin brings upon us.
When we believe God over our own contrary ways, we begin the first step of receiving His miracle of healing. Therein is faith. And by faith, all things are possible. If by faith we continually call upon Jesus to save us from our sin and its curse, He will save us. “All who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Joel 2:32. Acts 2:21, Room.10:13.
2. Confess Re-occurring unbelief
Admit your wrongs to God, all of them, asking Him to forgive and cleanse you from them. Do this with past and present wrongs as they resurface. Every time you realize that you’ve sinned, even if you just confessed moments ago, and then turned around and to do it again, confess again for your re-occurred sin. God is faithful and right to forgive and cleanse us every time. There is no limit to how many times in a day that we can confess recommitted sin to God. He forgives and cleanses again and again. The result brings more healing and change of character every time.
Within forgiveness and cleansing, beyond the cleansing of our record in Heaven, Jesus begins a miracle work of cleansing to our spirit, soul, mind, and body. It’s a miraculous work that is far beyond what we can do for ourselves.
Admission of need
Admission of need, and confession of sin, enables us to receive from Jesus the forgiveness and healing that we need. We cannot receive from God that which we don’t admit need of. God will never force His will upon us. He will never make us His puppet. His love has given to us free will. He will never violate free will by changing what we don’t really want changed. Forgiveness and healing from addiction can be received from God only by those who truly believe God and admit their need of being changed.
Letting go
When we admit and confess our sins to God, we are letting go of them. He takes them upon himself. Jesus is beyond the past, present, and future. He took our admitted sin upon himself and suffered its penalty. The penalty was – separation from God the Father, shame, suffering, death on a cross, and a sentence in hell; all of the things that we deserved. He was then raised from death and hell. He had no personal sin of his very own with which to be locked in hell. Jesus, in His perfection, rose from the dead and left our confessed sin in hell.
This happened long ago, once and for all. But within Jesus Christ, every time we admit, confess, and release our sin to him, it is left in hell, and our deliverance from it happens in the now. If this sounds confusing, think about this. God is beyond our time restrictions. In time, his payment for our sin happened long ago. As we live within Jesus, who is beyond time, his release from hell happens for us in the now, when we confess our sin, every time.
Jesus doesn’t go through crucifixion over and over, but his sacrifice continually functions for us every time we admit and confess our sin to him. When we confess our sin to God, he mixes our time with his attribute of being in the past, present, and future, and applies his payment to our time.
As we learn to receive God’s forgiveness through true belief and confession, the cleansing of the spirit, soul, and body takes place [1 John 1:9]. The more we practice admission and confession of sin, the more forgiveness we are enabled to receive. Received forgiveness gives us healing from our paralyzing condition, enabling us to walk in God’s rightness, and thus, deliverance from addiction.
Jesus taught that forgiveness can heal the paralyzed. The addicted have some paralyzed mind and character.
“Which is easier to say to the paralyzed man: ‘Your Sins are forgiven’, or to say, ‘Get up, pick up your mat, and walk?” (Mark 2:9).
Why stay paralyzed? As a true believer of the way, truth, and life of Yeshua (Jesus), practice confession of contrary ways to Him moment by moment as they surface. To the degree that we truly do this, He is faithful and right to forgive and cleanse our spirit, soul, and body. You will be amazed.
3. Walk in the Spirit of Christ
This step comes naturally as we practice the other two. Walking in the Spirit is the alternative to walking in sin. In the Holy Spirit, we hunger and thirst for knowing God’s words, presence, and the people in whom He lives. His love is the motivation for all that we do. In the spirit of Christ, we serve God and neighbor, helping to release the captives of all types of addiction, sowing seeds of healing.
One of the many marvels of walking in the spirit of Christ is, since we plant seeds that produce a harvest of release from bondage, we also harvest the same kind of release in abundance.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, I can see my need to confess my sins of addiction as they occur. From the least to the enormous, I now confess them and choose to continue confessing them to you as they occur. Deliver me from my hardness of heart. Open my eyes and ears to your way, truth, and life more with each confession of failure. Your presence is healing, and I invite you to do your work of cure to all of my addictions, be they thought or deed, as I confess my failures to you.
Thank you Lord Jesus for your never ending love.
Amen.
YESHUA TRAIL 