Crossroads of Hope for the Addictions of Life

Dusty Brackett

We are repeatedly asked, “What is the success rate at Crossroads Rescue Mission?” 

The question itself is fair, but it raises other questions that must be answered first to define the parameters of the answer to the initial question.

First, what do you mean by “success”?  Well, before we can determine if we are successful we must understand what failure is.  What is the problem over which we wish to be successful?  Here is where CRM differs from many rehabilitation agencies.  We do not see drugs or alcohol or sexual perversion as the problem.  We see these as the symptoms of the problem.  Our society wastes millions of dollars dealing with the symptoms while ignoring the root.  The root of “addiction,” the socially acceptable ones as well as the socially unacceptable ones, is a prideful, selfish heart.  The only hope any man has of breaking the chains of a selfish heart is through the power of the cross of Christ.  No “12 steps” of self reliance will free a man from this master.  He may stop drinking or using drugs but the prideful heart has not been dealt with; it will still dominate his life in other areas, wrecking and ruining relationships.  The 1 step program of “draw nigh to God and He will draw night to you,” is a man’s only hope.  As a man humbles himself through the grace given to him by the Lord, recognizes his hopeless condition and in repentance yields to God, God will transform his life. 

What is the catalyst that God uses to produce this transforming freedom?  The Scriptures tell us that the “truth will make us free.”  Ah, freedom!  But the carnal heart asks with Pilate, “What is truth?”  Christ answered this question in His high priestly prayer of John 17 when He stated, “Thy word is truth.” It is through the Word of God that a man is brought to the realization of the condition of his prideful heart. It is through the Word of God that he comes to realize the sufficiency of the finished work of Christ. It is through the Word of God that he is brought into a right relationship with God. As that man continually grows in his humility and submission towards God, he will experience a greater and greater life of liberty from his selfish, prideful heart.  This will lead him into a deeper and deeper relationship with God on a personal level and his life will become so satisfied with God that the void that he tried to fill with alcohol, drugs, and women is now satisfied with the Divine Presence.  Living lives free of drugs and alcohol is a by product of a humble submitted heart. It is the work of God through the finished work of Christ.

This leads us to state that it is not rehabilitation that a man needs but Regeneration, a personal Relationship with God, then Restoration to the man, husband, and father he was created to be.

Therefore if failure is defined by selfish pride, then success is living a life of selfless humility.  It is far more than being free from drugs. One sure sign of the Holy Spirit’s work in a man’s life is his growing concern for his family and fellow residents at the mission. In this sense we are all a work in progress and will never achieve complete success until we stand before the throne of God without spot or wrinkle. 

If a resident of CRM follows the Word of God our success rate is 100%! It works every time.  When a man comes to God on God’s terms he never leaves empty handed.  The best we can hope to do for a man is to introduce him to the truth of the Word and encourage his progress in the Word, but ultimately he determines how far he is willing to go.

So what is the success rate of CRM.  Candidly, I do not know.  With some men we have been very successful, by contemporary standards. With others we have failed miserably because they have gone through our program and returned to a life of addiction.  Others have wandered for some time and then returned to embrace what they have cast aside.  God is ever working and we see this as a process of growth as God deals with the men where they are to bring them to where they need to be.

God does not judge us by the values of success that the world uses.  He rewards faithfulness.  So maybe folks should be asking us, “How faithful is Crossroads Rescue Mission to God’s purposes in the lives of the men there?” And that is a sobering question.

Gerald Roberts

A Change of direction is not the arrival at to our destination. It is however the beginning of our journey to our ultimate purpose. Before I met Christ, I had no aim in life or higher objective. I was living for myself and for gratification through material or relational means. I was in a pursuit of the things in this world that were temporal and fleeting. But the Lord has been revealing his plan for me and for my life. He has created us all for a purpose and that purpose is to love Him and to love others. Christ instructs us of this in Matthew 22:

35 Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, 36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law? 37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

So in his word, God has provided us with a “blueprint” of his plan for our lives. As we go through life’s struggles and challenges, these occasions are intended by God to mold and shape us into the believers and worshippers he would have us to be. So as I go through my daily walk, I try to see each trial as a lesson the Lord is allowing me to experience, that I will be developed in his will. I don’t always like it and I seldom understand where and how he is guiding me, but to receive the full blessing awaiting me, I have to approach each situation with a full trust in God.

God has a plan for us and he knows why he places certain people and situations in our path. Sometimes they are intended to develop us. Sometimes we are to be the examples to others. In this life, we can never come into contact with another person and not be affected in some way. At the end of our day, during that quiet prayer and meditation time we have with the Lord, we should look back at the activities of the day and ask God to reveal to us the meanings of our interactions with others. We can examine each encounter and look for the details that the lord was trying to reveal to us through the people we have made contact with. And with the Lord’s favor and a little dedication to this exercise, we will begin to see “that all things work together for the good to them that love God…”

Romans 8:

28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. 29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. 30Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. 31 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?

Gerald Roberts

Past performance does not necessarily indicate future results.

What does this mean? In the financial world, this is a disclaimer used primarily to alert investors that even though a stock or mutual fund has done well in the past, it is not guaranteed in any way to do so in the future. This is a required disclaimer by the Securities and Exchange Commission as a warning to investors or potential investors to do their homework and understand the nature of the investment vehicle they are considering venturing into.

The seller of the stock, bond, or fund, The Broker, wants you to buy his product. Like any salesman, he will be quick to show you all the shiny bells and neat whistles but may fail to disclose the flat tire.

We hold on to “past results” when someone we know is trying to change from an old lifestyle. We frequently will not give them credit for what they are trying to do, and as a result are waiting to see them fail. We make bets on how long it will take them to return to their old ways. As soon as they stumble we are quick to say “you see? I told you he wasn’t for real!”

Proverbs 24:17 warns us not to do so with our enemies; “Rejoice not when thine enemy falleth, and let not thine heart be glad when he stumbleth:” How much more then for our brother?

Sometimes, we even have these perceptions about ourselves. We can be our own worst enemy, telling ourselves there is no use in trying to change; we are just going to fail anyway.

Past performance is not indicative of future results! We do not have to fail. We do not have to expect others to fail. When we do this we are creating a self fulfilling prophecy that goes against Bible teaching.  2^nd Corinthians 5:17 tells us “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

I am reminded of a Christian brother of mine who recently left a concern with which we were both involved. I wished him well, and truly hoped and prayed for his success in his new endeavor. However, in the back of my mind I was giving him a window of time in which I expected to see him fail. I look at this now and can see it was a combination of my knowledge of his past and a projection of my own past history combined. I knew he had tried on several occasions to change his life with limited success, but so had I. It was probably more of my own shortcomings being projected onto him than a desire to really see him fail. It could have been my way of coping with my own fear of failing again. Either way it was not fair to him or me. Neither was I trusting in the power of the Lord to do magnificent things in both of our lives.

Further, it is bad enough that I harbored these thoughts within myself. If they had been known to him at the time, they could have served as a stumbling block to him. When we step out on something new, stepping out on faith, we do not need discouragement from the brethren. This is not love, and is counter to the commandments to love one another.

 1 Peter 3:8 Finally, be ye all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful, be courteous:
1 John 3:14 We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.

When I see myself thinking and acting in this manner I am reminded of this passage in James 1: ⁵If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.  ⁶But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.  ⁷For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.  ⁸A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.  ⁹Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted:  ¹⁰But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.  ¹¹For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.  ¹²Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.