How should we as Christians respond to a person struggling with an addiction? If I were to ask different groups of Christians that question, I imagine I would get different responses. The only sufficient answer to the question posed is that Christians respond to persons struggling with addiction by presenting the gospel.
How Christians deal with addiction, or any other sin, is by pointing people to Jesus. Pointing people to Jesus is not simplistic; it is very profound. We as Christians do not have a systematic set of steps for people to follow. What we have is a Savior, the Lord, who shed His own blood for sinners. The same God who spoke the universe into existence, who creates planets by the sound of His voice, loved people such that His Son Jesus died and rose again for sinners. This answer to addiction is profound.
It seems to me that the Apostle Paul would agree. In 1 Corinthians 6: 9-11, he says that drunkards as well as other sinners had been changed by Christ. Verse 11 says “Some of you were like this; but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God”. The Corinthian church had a lot of sinners in it. They were aware of addiction; they were equipped to help addicts. Some of them had been addicts. Some of them had lost the ability to choose whether or not they would drink. Alcohol had controlled some of them. However, they were washed, sanctified, and justified by Christ and the Spirit of God. The gospel was their “road to recovery”.
The church has a lot to offer addicts in terms of love and support. And there is some Christ-centered literature on the topic of addiction. But I want to encourage Christians and addicts to remember that Christ is sufficient, and the church is equipped to deal with the problem of addiction.
