There is nothing like the joy of the Lord

“Felicity” is a word for happiness rarely used nowadays.  It is found in the old Anglican Book of Common Prayer as a companion expression to “everlasting joy.”  The adjective felicitous means “pleasant, charming and delightful” and “good fortune” or “continued blessing” with emphasis on duration rather than intensity.  It means “steady happiness” more than “instant fun”  – more like belonging to a rich family than like winning Lotto.  Felicity lasts on and on so you feel great whenever you think of the felicitous thing.  Felicitous is what you feel when someone you love gets married to someone you admire.  Anytime you think about their gorgeous wedding you feel good, thrilled for them and happy to have participated.  A TV sitcom might be fun but it’s not lasting joy, therefore not felicitous.  Likewise a theme park would not be called felicitous.  Great music, however, is definitely felicitous when you’re in the right mood and can appreciate it.  I can hardly think of anything more felicitous in this world than a Mozart concerto heard at a time and place that permits complete focus of the heart and mind.

You don’t have to be a Bible scholar to experience the felicity of the Lord.  However, I do believe you need a drug-free brain.  God knew I was an addict and once my brain was clean and I had begun to do His will, He gave me tastes of His felicity, something I had not experienced before.  Eventually lasting joy began bubbling away down below in the substratum of consciousness, there even in times of grief and pain.

Every addict wants to feel good all the time.  That’s why I took drugs.  When I finally came clean, I had much to learn about the business of feeling good without drugs.  There were things I had to go through in order to feel good, like detoxification and grief, and there were other things I had to get out of like self-pity and resentment.  Pain was one of the things I had to go through.

The problem of pain

Pain comes and goes.  Everybody knows that – except people like me before we come to our senses.  The reason I did not know pain “comes and goes” was that I always took a drug before pain came just in case it might be coming and, of course, I never knew that pain eventually, naturally goes because I was loaded with painkillers.  This was part and parcel of my habit.

So I had lessons to learn after I got clean, painful lessons, the kind that cause many addicts to relapse back onto drugs.  Yet the only way to learn about pain is to experience pain.  Pain is not the enemy!  Rather it is a signal that the enemy is up and about.  We need pain for without it, we die.  One of the world’s greatest experts on pain, Dr. Paul Brand, says that alcoholics and people with Hanson’s disease (leprosy) can destroy themselves because they don’t feel pain properly[1].

But here is where the joy of the Lord comes in.  I mean the Lord’s joy, not your joy or my joy or the fun that comes from a good joke or a good time.  The Lord’s joy is pervasive, making pain a signal instead of a disaster.  And the Lord’s joy lasts and lasts: it is highly felicitous.

I remember an evening when I was driving my car to a church meeting about twenty-km from my flat.  I lived alone in those days and was celibate (not by choice) and things were not going particularly well at work.  I had money for essentials but life was nothing to brag about.  When asked, “How are things?” I would reply “Things are painful but God is good.”  (I reckoned that was scriptural.)  I’d been suffering a stiff neck, purely muscular but annoying.  All the really effective painkillers were no-no for me because I’d abused them in the past.

Anyway my church had recommended three days of prayer and fasting for healing and this particular moment, in the car on the way to the meeting, was at the end of day three (my stiff neck had abated, thank you Jesus).  After the service there would be what Australians call “supper” meaning tea and biscuits not the incredible spread of “plates” often supplied by the sisters.

So it wasn’t the anticipation of food when, at a stoplight, I suddenly found myself telling myself how absolutely great I felt.  My whole body was flooded with wellbeing, somewhat like a heroin hit except of course I had been completely drug-free a long time and, anyway, the feeling didn’t come in a rush from below but was descending like a soft wind from above, from outside the car, like rays from heaven.  I couldn’t believe it was happening to me.  Billy Graham, yes, or Mother Theresa but not Charles!  Charles, former scumbag, drug addict, con man, thief, liar and cheat, now FREE, drug-free – nothing in the blood but blood – crime-free, guilt-free, shame-free, fear-free.  NEW!  Charles, new Charles, driving a paid-for car to CHURCH (of all places), is NOW a different person!  Jesus is right, God is real!  Thank you, Jesus! 

I told myself I must never forget how wonderful I felt at that moment – not just the absence of worry but the presence of deep joy.  But, of course, now, even as I write this, I cannot completely recapture the experience.  Not that the joy, the felicity, has gone, it hasn’t.  It is with me most of the time these days.  That was the first time I felt it but I’m used to it now.  It is the way I was supposed to feel from the beginning, before the fall of man.  We were created with the capacity to feel good all the time.  Thank you Jesus!

Back to Adam

Adam had a felicitous life with God.  He lived in lovely surroundings where every need was supplied.  He had companionship with a beautiful woman and a great relationship with his Creator, not to mention an interesting gardening apprenticeship (Genesis 2:15) with a brilliant future in zoology (2:19).  I’m sure he felt good.  But he lost all this, blew it, by disobeying God.

Recently, I was introduced to a congregation by a church elder who, like most elders, could not resist saying a few words of his own.  He went through the main points of my bio, university professor becomes alcoholic and addict, and then finished, hoping I would not be offended, saying, “I give you Charles (pause) who should have known better!” 

Certainly I was not offended.  But I had to set them straight.  “Actually, I knew better,” I told them, “but I did it anyway!”

With regard to Adam, wilfulness is a theological issue.  With regard to Charles, it was a simple fact: I took LSD in 1961 because I wanted to.  Does it really matter why?  I knew it probably wasn’t a good idea but I took it anyway.  After all, it was legal then and manufactured by an ethical drug house.  Reports in the literature said it was not addicting.  Colleagues were taking it.  Engaged in legitimate research, I was about to dispense it to my patients so shouldn’t I take it myself?  (“And when the woman saw that the tree was… a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.” 3:6)

Now most Bible commentaries downplay the importance of the fruit itself in order to emphasize the importance of disobedience.  My Ryrie Study Bible (KJV) says in a footnote to 3:6, “Their sin was more than merely eating forbidden fruit; it was disobeying the revealed word of God, believing the lie of Satan, and placing their own wills above God’s.”

However, to an addict like me, the fruit itself is terribly important.  Clearly the word “fruit” is meant in a general sense as are the words “took”, “eat” and “gave” – even “touch” (3:3).  That particular fruit represents anything that we should not take or ingest into our own bodies or give to others to take.  (Smoking or injecting it would have been just as bad!)  My great mistake was putting into my bloodstream a substance that altered my mind.  It looked OK – only 500 micrograms, so small it was hardly there.  I was told I would have an experience that would put me in the know.  At some level I knew it was dangerous but I was willing to take the risk.  I wanted to be a sophisticated scientist, perhaps to write a book.  Though neither my colleagues nor I believed in God, still I knew at some level that I was doing something risky – even wrong.  I knew better but I did it anyway!

In the grip of drugs

Although Adam’s and Charles’ stories have much in common, important differences exist.  Adam was happily living in Eden and walking with God whereas Charles, living in a fallen world, was miserable driving to work, drinking too much alcohol and trying to discover how to become a famous scientist.  Another obvious difference between Adam and me was that after his bite, Adam became anxious (Genesis 3:10) whereas after mine, I felt high.  Reason: drugs temporarily relieved my unhappiness.

Some drug counsellors and psychologists place great emphasis on one’s state of mind previous to taking drugs as a cause of addiction.  They look for predisposing factors.  Some believe they might be genetic.  Low self-esteem is often cited.  So are social influences.  A troubled childhood.  There could be hundreds of such conditions.  I think these counsellors are barking up the wrong tree.

No, I agree with the other scientists, the modern bio-chemical experts and neurophysiologists who emphasize the brain changes that occur after starting to take drugs.  They actually call addiction a brain disease because modern technology reveals lasting changes in the brain caused by the kinds of drugs I took.  The brain-disease theory, which is surprisingly consistent with the Biblical view, simply means that, although my first hit is voluntary, the drugs eventually take over and then it matters little why I started.  We can analyse reasons forever but I’ll still keep on using.  Similarly, the Bible doesn’t go into all the possible motives for Adam to take a bite.  The point is that the first bite caused a natural and spiritual downfall.  In modern times this means that, having started, reversing the downward trend, quitting (and staying stopped) is impossible without divine help.

A fallen world

Concerning my relationship with the Lord in those days, the most charitable thing I can say is that I didn’t have one.  A less charitable depiction: I didn’t believe in God, I hated God and thought I was God.  I was misinformed and I deceived myself.  But I really couldn’t help myself.  In one sense I was not entirely to blame: I was born into a fallen world caused by Adam’s disobeying God.  For my strivings and empty successes, for my missed opportunities, for the whole soap opera of my former life, for my predisposition to be an addict, even for my self-deception, I am not totally responsible.  You can say I should have known better than to live my life as I did but I was doing the best I could.  I was a psychologist.  What else could I do?

…only one thing, one way out: I could have turned to God.  I could have surrendered my will and life over to Him.  Instead, I repeated Adam’s mistake.

For this I am responsible.  I knew better but I did it anyway.  I took that first drug.  And although I felt good afterward and had temporary relief from my angst, eventually, of course, drugs made my life even worse.  Plus, I couldn’t quit!

Addiction is a brain disease

Alan I. Leshner is director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health of the USA.  He says the majority of the biomedical community now considers addiction to be a “condition caused by persistent changes in brain structure and function.”[2]

We now know in great detail the brain mechanisms through which drugs acutely modify mood, memory, perception, and emotional states.  Using drugs repeatedly over time changes brain structure and function in fundamental and long-lasting ways that can persist long after the individual stops using them.  Addiction comes about through an array of neuroadaptive changes and the laying down and strengthening of new memory connections in various circuits in the brain.  We do not yet know all the relevant mechanisms, but the evidence suggests that those long-lasting brain changes are responsible for the distortions of cognitive and emotional functioning that characterize addicts, particularly including the compulsion to use drugs that is the essence of addiction.  It is as if drugs have high-jacked the brain’s natural motivational control circuits, resulting in drug use becoming the sole, or at least the top, motivational priority for the individual.

Jesus Christ says it more succinctly (John 8:34), “Whosoever committeth sin is the slave of sin.”

I have studied Jesus’ remark for twenty years and still find new depth of meaning and scientific truth in His brilliant formulation.  One obvious modern meaning is, “Anybody who takes drugs becomes the slave of drugs.”  But that’s only the beginning.

Jesus defines the word “sin”.  He says sin is some thing we do that we can’t stop doing.  The Bible term for the cause of addiction is “sin”.  Taking drugs is a sin.  The point is you are trapped by it.  You think you can control it but you can’t.  Eventually it will get you and do you in.  It leads to slavery and death.

Notice that “committeth sin” means active participation.  If a physician administers a drug on the operating table, you don’t become addicted.  Only when you “take and eat” yourself (or shoot up, snort, smoke, etc.) do you become a slave of the drug.  The brain-disease, biomedical scientists have research data to prove this point.

Drugs are not the only way to become addicted.  Other behaviours such as gambling, compulsive sex, bulimia, anorexia, compulsive eating, repeated risk-taking, serial crime and other sins are similar to drugs in the way they change the brain and the mind.  The point is, once we do it, “it” takes over and we can’t stop.

Jesus made his remark to people who believed in him[3] but were addicted to various sins.  They thought they had control of themselves but they did not.  He said that if they were free as they claimed, they would easily be able to understand what he was saying.  Yet no matter how he tried to spell out the truth, they couldn’t/wouldn’t hear him properly, denied his message (8:43) and hated him for calling them sinners (addicts) just like drug users today who don’t want to quit.  Finally they began throwing stones at him.  He had to fade into the crowd to avoid getting hit.

Jesus says sin is not just an action or a thought but a being that takes control!  You and I can easily become sin’s servants or slaves.  Sin is wants us to work for it.  The neurological scientists who discovered addiction to be a brain disease would probably not put it quite this way.  Still what they are implying is that addiction is analogous to a computer virus with a mind of its own.  Sin goes its own way and does its own thing.

The disease with a will of its own

I have done some research on this phenomenon.  In meetings of Narcotics Anonymous people who are not biologists and who have never read the Bible, share with each other about their “disease of addiction.”  Some social scientists (not up to date on the latest biomedical information) ridicule NA for claiming addiction to be a disease.  These social scientists claimed addiction was merely learned behaviour not a genuine symptomatic entity.  The NA’s insisted it was a disease; the Soc. Sci. experts insisted it wasn’t.

What the experts could not understand was why the NAs were so adamant about their disease concept.  Most thought NAs mitigated guilt and shame through the word disease or were using it to avoid moral responsibility.  Others thought NAs were just ignorant of the true scientific definition of disease.  But if you attend NA regularly, you soon discover that the reason has little to do with etiology, etymology or morality.  It has to do with the disease talking!

Drug users commonly have auditory hallucinations.  The drugs I took included, among others, LSD, dimethyltriptomine, mescaline, psylocibin and marijuana.  Under the influence of such hallucinogenic substances I heard voices and saw visions.  Even after detoxification, I had the occasional “flashback” until all neural connections had normalized.  Yet the experience I had later when I was trying to remain abstinent was of a different order: something was telling me to use drugs.  Not necessarily an audible sound but always a concrete thought: use, use.  This “craving message” is an experience shared by nearly every recovering addict after, sometimes long after, they have quit.  For example:

One addict says, “I heard a voice telling me to take my drug.  It said, ‘One won’t hurt.’  When I gave in and shot up, the same voice said, ‘now you’ve done it, you might as well do the lot; give up this recovery thing altogether.’”

Another tells her story, “My disease thinks it can kill me and go on living.  It tells me to use even though for me using is suicide.”

Bob, clean many years, called the voice his head.  “My head is my enemy.  It’s the voice that used to tell me to use drugs.  Though it knows it lost that game, it still tries to do me in.  I think of it as a dark bird of prey, a vulture sitting on my bedstead at night waiting for morning.  When I open my eyes, it starts, “Bob, I want a word with you.”  Next it says, “You haven’t had enough sleep.”  Every time, “not enough sleep”.  I could have twelve hours and it still says “Not enough, Bob, you’d better sleep in and take a sickie.”

Jack, sober thirty years, says, “I felt something come out of my body.  The voice saying “drink, drink” left me then.  Still it’s out there ready to come back – if I pick up a drink.”

Even allowing for a degree of dramatization, the parallel between the disease concept of the recovering addict and what the Bible calls a “demon” or “devil” is striking.  Their “disease of addiction” has a life of its own and it “talks” to you telling you negative things that are not good for you.  It feels exactly as though it comes into your body when you relapse onto drugs.  And eventually, if you stay clean long enough, it may leave you altogether.

Until recently, many scientific drug experts discredited the stories of recovering addicts as dramatic, superstitious nonsense encouraged by NA’s belief in a “higher power”.  As recently as ten years ago, a chief psychologist in the local “Alcohol and Drug Authority” told me, “your disease concept is indefensible.”  Lately the atmosphere has changed due to two overwhelming scientific trends:

a)   The computer metaphor has replaced the out-dated mechanical, “field” and “dynamic” models as the most popular analogy of brain functioning.  If nervous systems are information systems, why can’t the brain be a host to devilish viruses like the Internet is?  If a “love bug” can take over your computer, why can’t a “drug bug” take over your addicted brain?

b)   Recent developments in neurology and biology support the computer analogy and prompt biomedical scientists like Leshner to talk, “…as if drugs have high-jacked the brain’s natural motivational control circuits, resulting in drug use becoming the sole, or at least the top, motivational priority for the individual.”

So science has nearly caught up with Jesus’ brain model of two thousand years ago.  We are not dealing with ordinary learned behaviour that can be unlearned at any time but long-lasting brain changes that resist what the scientists call “extinction.”  The message is clear, if you have never taken a mind or mood-altering drug, don’t!

But what if you have and can’t stop no matter how hard you try?  What’s the answer?  Unfortunately, science is, so far, much better at diagnosis than treatment.  What they call “patient non-compliance” is the problem.  First, addicts must remain abstinent and in treatment long enough for their neural networks to restore and the craving to go away, then they must learn never to take any mind or mood altering drugs again.  They usually must change their whole lifestyle in order to remain drug-free.  Thought patterns must change.  It’s the first drug that does the damage and the most dangerous drug may be the one they haven’t tried yet.  They need to make new friends and stay out of “old playgrounds and old playmates.”  They need to associate regularly with others in recovery.  They need to work on recovery and spend time helping others.  Even so, complete abstinence now and forever is a big order and the relapse rate is extremely high, approaching 100% – without divine assistance.

The good news is that John 8:34 is not Jesus’ last word on the subject.  In John 8:35 he solves the problem for us.  At least he solves it for those willing to listen and not throw rocks at the suggestion we might be sinners.