How is that on an island of men who are recovering from drug addiction, I can feel more love and more welcome than most churches I have gone to in America? How did 6 years go by just like that? Back in 2018 when I heard God's calling to "just go" to Asia, I literally had no idea why i was going to go. Looking back, it's so clear, and my plan was to come again in 2019 and bring a group of musicians and believers with me so that they might see what Jesus is doing in the lives of the most broken in Asia. Then the pandemic happened, and the world stopped for a few years.
Being on dawn island again, it feels like it was just last year. That same love that I felt, that caring, so many of the brothers who were once drug addicts and became followers of Jesus and staff members, helping others who are going through drug addiction now, remembered me. They remember such details like how I brought a suitcase with me and my guitar, they were like "where's your guitar this time?" It's so crazy.
Drug addiction is not just a physical problem, it's ultimately a heart problem. A heart problem that only Dr Jesus can heal. I've never done drugs before but my desperation for Jesus and the emptiness that I feel without Him is no different than the brothers on the island. In my world, it's just a different kind of "drug."
Money, ambition, success, social media, pride, our phones, sometimes these are just as, if not more powerful, than the drugs that the brothers on the island experience. Our "addiction" is no different.
Any time we try to fill the void with anything but Jesus, we end up just as lost and broken. Faith, hope, love and utlimately peace, these are the things that we long for, but we are so distracted. Satan is so cunning that we think we don't have a drug problem. All of us are running around addicted, and it is robbing us of our love for people, our hope, and our peace.
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