by Paul Davis
As a son of a mother who was an alcoholic, I can tell you from firsthand experience the cause of alcoholism. Unlike food that satisfies a physical need, alcohol which provides no bodily nourishment satisfies a spiritual need.
Alcohol is a mind-altering chemical and anesthetic that dulls the emotional pain of one’s existence. The gnawing internal dissatisfaction with life is the primary reason for substance abuse. Young men who don’t have the courage in and of themselves to approach a young lady think by drinking their inhibitions will lessen if not go away. Hence the dissatisfaction ultimately is with oneself and his or her life. Sadly many resort to substances before they work on themselves within. After the substance wears off you have got the same personal challenges and emotional pain to contend with.
My mother was always troubled by the fact she was adopted. Even though my beloved grandparents gave her all of their love and everything under the sun, she found no comfort within. My entire childhood all I knew about my mother was that she was either out getting drunk, in jail under arrest, or at a mental ward receiving psychiatric care for rehabilitation. I do have one fond memory from when I was about 5 years old of my mother rubbing my back while I was laying in bed, a sweet experience which I savor.Thankfully my maternal grandparents, father, and step-mother stood in the gap and cared for me in the absence of my mother.
Alcoholics have an intense spiritual thirst that if unmet will drive them as they seek to find spiritual harmony, whereby they can be made whole. The hippie movement of the 1960s rejected the progression of materialism their parents had made and replaced it with their form of a spiritual quest. Sadly their parents who came from a generation of little neglected to provide their children with some of the true spiritual riches they did have as they went hard after getting for them the things they did not. How ironic that the first American generation to have it all was the generation which turned to substances to find relief.
The great Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung wrote a letter in January 1961 to Bill Wilson (the founder of Alcoholics of Anonymous): “Alcohol in Latin is spiritus, and you use the same word for the highest religious experience as well as for the most depraving poison.”
Jesus said, “God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship him in spirit and in truth. The true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.” (John 4:24,23)
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman seeking to draw water from the well, “Whosoever drinks of this water shall thirst again: Whosoever drinks of the water that I shall give her shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give her shall be in her a well of water springing up into everlasting life.” (John 4:13-14)
Sadly my mother only got dead religion from her upbringing and never found her way to the best bartender – Christ the head of the Church. Her name, Marsha-Anne Krofchik, a cheerleader who attended Boone High School (one of two high-schools in Orlando before Disney World came to town). She made homecoming court, graduated from UCF with honors and I’m told by an Orlando Police Department Officer who knew her that she was the most beautiful young lady in the city of Orlando in her day. Unfortunately Marsha never discovered her inner beauty.
My aunt Paulette, her cousin, told me that when she saw Marsha she was either smiling real pretty or nearly crying as if something deep within was bothering her. I was 2 years old at that time.
My grandfather Paul Krofchik (retired Lt. Colonel, U.S. Army) who everyone said was the nicest man they’d ever met was deeply troubled by his only child’s battle with the bottle. He would often go driving around the city looking for her. I once saw it written outside of a local bar, “Don’t let Marsha in here!”
Daddy’s little girl died one early morning at 2am when running across a street drunk. She was hit by an 18 year-old driver who was also drunk. Drinking and driving is a deadly combination.
My father said at the funeral he had never seen my grandfather look so grievous. Pop-Pop (as I affectionately called my grandfather) was like a Dad to me. I and my grandma Nana adored him and he us. He never missed one of my baseball games. He participated in Cub Scouts with me. And so much more!
Ironically Pop-Pop had a problem putting down the bottle too, although he was a functional alcoholic. Apparently after losing his daughter Marsha and nearly losing my Nana too due to a hiatal hernia Pop-Pop started finding a degree of temporary comfort in the bottle.
I had noticed when I was staying with my grandparents and using Pop-Pop’s car that he had stashed some little vodka bottles in his trunk. Maybe in some strange way that is how he got closed to hisdeceased daughter. I tried to gently confront him about it and ask him to just drink at home and not in his car behind the wheel. His eyesight wasn’t the greatest anyhow. A couple years after my mom died, Pop-Pop took a bad fall around 11:30am at a local convenient store. I got to talk to him at the ER where he was admitted for the night. It was the last conversation I had with him, as within 24 hours he had a stroke and lost his ability to speak. Upon going to the store to retrieve his car I found two small bottles of vodka in the door compartment (one of which had been opened and was half empty).
Pop-Pop spent his last two months bed ridden in a nursing home and then died. My Nana and I missed him terribly.
All I can say is please don’t drink alcohol and subject your loved ones to such grief and misery.
The “new wine” of heaven is available for whosoever will drink of it (Acts 2:13). Ask and invite the Holy Spirit that rose Christ from the dead to come in and fill your troubled heart in Jesus’ name. I promise you once you taste of the rivers of life by the mighty Holy Spirit you shall never thirst again! (Revelation 22:17)
Paul Davis is a masterful poet, worldwide professional speaker, minister and author of several books including Breakthrough for a Broken Heart; and Stop Lusting %26 Start Living.
Paul is a life coach (relational %26 professional), popular keynote speaker, creative consultant, humor being, adventurer, explorer, mediator, liberator and dream-maker.
Paul’s compassion for people %26 passion to travel has taken him to over 50 countries of the world where he has had a tremendous impact. Paul has also brought revival to many in war-torn, impoverished and tsunami stricken regions of the earth. His organization Dream-Maker Ministries is building dreams, breaking limitations and reviving nations!
Paul’s Breakthrough Seminars inspire, awaken, impregnate with purpose, impart the fire of desire, catapult people into a new level of self-awareness, facilitate destiny discovery and dream fulfillment.
Contact Paul to minister, speak at your event or for life coaching: RevivingNations%40yahoo.com, 407-967-7553
For additional info: http://www.DreamMakerMinistries.com, http://www.CreativeCommunications.TV