Addiction: How to Help Hurting Peopleনমুনা

To help hurting people, you must recognize the greatest pain in the human heart.

The greatest pain in the human heart is not the presence of problems - it's the absence of purpose. We complicate things when we try to medicate our pain with addiction. When the heart is malnourished of love, joy, and purpose, the hand reaches out for any substance that promises to numb the pain of emptiness. Our instincts cause us to reach for anything that will provide us with a good feeling. The prodigal son squandered his birthright trying to fill that emptiness.

Hurting people are living with a massive void of what life was made to be. We understand hunger and thirst in the natural realm. People will speak up and boldly say they need food or water. You will hear someone say, “I have a headache. I have not had enough water.” However, people do not know how to recognize the emptiness of the heart and how that impacts them. We don’t know how to reconcile, or even talk about, the emptiness we feel inside.

This is where we come in. We have the opportunity to be ministers of reconciliation. We can help people understand the state of their lives. We can help them understand the emptiness they feel. We can then point people to who God made them to be. We can look past the mess of their lives and believe in who they were made to be. We can speak to that empty heart. We can use words of truth that bring life back to their hearts.

As ministers of reconciliation, we don’t focus on their problems, we bring life to their emptiness. We get to be used by God to speak to people about the reconciliation that is possible. They can go from an empty life full of addiction to a fulfilling life of meaning and purpose.

Jesus shows us an example of this in how he responded to Peter after the resurrection. Peter was a man who lived with a call on his life. He was bold. He had faith. He spoke up quickly about what he believed. But when Jesus was betrayed, and the persecution began, Peter denied Jesus three times. Peter did the opposite of what he boldly proclaimed. He was probably living with shame and the thought that his calling was lost.

After the resurrection, Jesus appeared to Peter. Their conversation was simple but powerful. Jesus asked him, “Do you love me?” Peter answered, “I do Lord.” And Jesus looked at him and said, “Feed my sheep.”

There is more to the conversation. But consider the power of this simple interaction. Jesus did not ask Peter to explain why he did what he did. He did not point Peter to a program to get himself fixed. Jesus reminded him of his calling. This is what we can do as ministers of reconciliation.