Hello and welcome to our Relentless Series.
My name is Nick Vujicic, and today from the ministry of Life Without Limbs, we are so
thankful you're joining us today. In this Relentless Series, I’m talking about how we can
overcome various difficulties and obstacles. Today we're going to tackle the
topic of overcoming addiction. I want you to know that I love you, and
what you see is what you get with me, and I know that 2020 has absolutely thrown nothing
but curveballs in my life this year, and I know it's happened in yours. Something that you used
to continue to have rhythmically—work, school, friends, going out, life itself—has completely
changed, the true north work of our compass, mentally, emotionally, spiritually.
We are, I’m going to say, humans that love habits: rhythm. But then there's the other things
that we continue to repeat, that we also know, though, that is not good for us, and when
you look at the definition of an addiction, it's simply “a repeated activity or
choice that provides a rewarding effect even though it results in harmful consequences.”
It's a way of escaping present circumstances, so a lot of us, especially when we have those good
habits and that life that we used to have from day to day, week to week, from social things, family,
friends, business, it feels like a void is there, and how do we fill up that void? How do we
deal with these, I don't know, emotions that hijack us in such a way that we start to
do—maybe something we've never done before. You know there's always something that that
happens chemically in our brain every time we go to something that we know can be obvious—you know,
circumstances down the road, but let me tell you, when you talk about addiction, sure it
could be something that's obvious, like drugs or alcohol addiction or as subtle as a
compulsion to shop, or over, you know, overeat, I mean seriously there are so many things that we
sometimes just do and do and do, and in the end, we look at, and if we're really honest, we know
it's not good, especially when we're isolated with all this quarantine.
You know, all these addictions, I actually have heard that it's at least
at least 50 percent up in addictions, and as we've consulted someone who's a counselor
in this space, I’m not the counselor, and this is not a counseling little session with Nick, but I
just want to be real with you. I want to ask you a couple questions today. It's going to be raw.
You're going to have to be honest with yourself, but before you're honest with
yourself, I want to be honest with you. I look back at my 37 years of life, and I’ll tell
you right now, I’ve had some addictions, and when it's really bad sometimes, you're like, “Oh
no, I’m just going to do it!” you know, because someone else is doing it. Someone peer-pressures
you to do it or social pressure. Sometimes you just feel like you need that escape. Sometimes
you feel like, “Well I can't control anything in my life. I’ve got no arms no legs, and everyone's
making decisions for me, so I’m going to take control of my own life and my own destiny, and
this is going to be me. This is going to be my time. This is my little time for me, myself,
and I, and at first, it it's sometimes seemingly harmless. You know, sometimes it's stuff that that
grows slowly, slowly, and then grows, and moves, and morphs, and evolves into something
like, “Oh, my gosh, how did I get here!” It's like, you know, back in Australia when
you—how can I say—we had a saying back there where, you know, if you're saying something
about, I don't know, boiling frog—sorry for all the vegans—but boiling frogs, right? You sit
and the frogs don't understand how hot it gets, as long as they were in there when it wasn't
hot. It slowly boils them, and I even forgot what exactly the word, but I’ll never forget
that because that's exactly how addictions that ruin our lives come sneakily into our life, and
we become comfortable, and then we justify it, and we have our own way of saying, “No this
is what I’m going to do, even if someone tells me it's no good, I’m going to do it.”
In fact, if someone tells me that I shouldn't be doing it, what is it with our flesh that,
oh, my gosh, now it's even more attractive to do it because I’m told not to do it! I mean it's
a battle of the mind, so I’ll be real with you, I’m not going to talk to you about you looking
at you, until I share with you what I’ve gone through. You know, when I was a teenager that was
the very first time I had ever seen pornography, and I tell you, it's dangerous, and my friends
they would even have magazines at high school, and I had never seen that stuff, and for a while it
was really, really hard to stop thinking about it. It was like at a certain time of day, it
would be like, “Oh yeah, evening's coming, and it's like I don't know.” It's this chemical
reaction in my brain having that satisfaction, and we all understand that money, drugs, sex,
alcohol, pornography, fame, and fortune. If you put your happiness in temporary things, your
happiness will be temporary. We know that, and then there are times around my life
where I’ve actually witnessed people who drink a little bit, and then they drink a little
bit more, and then they don't know when to stop. There's been times—sure, you know—where I’m like,
“Oh man, I can't feel my legs,” but I never became an alcoholic, and I see how alcohol can sneakily
get up to you and say, “Wow, back in the day, you know as a young twenty-something, I’m like,
“Hey, yeah I know that I’m only going to have, you know, a beer or two, right?” Everything in
moderation, as long as you can have self-control, as long as you know that in everything in life,
anything in life, too much of it can kill you. Too much of water can kill you right? Too much
of air, keep breathing in, and let's force some more air in your lungs your lungs will pop!
Like that's the incredible thing about this world! Too much of anything, except for God, right?
It could be bad and we had to go through that. How did I overcome that? Well, first of all I
had to reflect and become honest with myself, and I don't know about you, but I love it
when someone gets a microphone in front of the audience who says, “You want me to be real? You
want me to be fake?” and everyone says, “Real!” I had to become real with me, with
myself, my mind, my feelings, and admit, “Nick, I don't think you've got this.” In fact,
this has overcome you. In fact, your subconscious self-esteem is drifting away and
how you used to love yourself, and how you used to see how God sees you, and
the joy of God, and what He wants to bring you.” You're limiting what God really wants to
give you, what the world can give you, what the feelings of all these things can give
you is nothing compared to what God can give you! God's got the best of the best of the best for
you. When He says no sex before marriage, okay? Sex before marriage is the counterfeit sex before
marriage is the devil's way to twist what God made beautiful. Jesus turned water
into wine. I don't want to get known to doctrinal issues and who drinks and who
doesn't, but let me just say this, okay? We must understand the point of
being honest and saying, “Yes, God, this is of my flesh, and I can't do this, and I
shouldn't do, and I need to listen to my guilt. That's your conscious speaking. It's the Holy
Spirit, and You can make an excuse. You can justify it anyway you like, but in the end, if
it's wrong, it's wrong. If it's overtaking you and changing what true foundation you have
of your value and purpose in Jesus Christ, and you're going to the world for
a peace and a joy and happiness, you're never going to find it, because
the world can't give you God's peace. God's purpose and God's best sex out of
marriage is never better than in marriage because He designed it that way, so when you
look at lust, when you look at substances, be careful. Listen to the Holy Spirit's conviction
of your sin. Don't suppress it. Don't bury it. I had a friend that got, you
know, addicted to cocaine. He didn't start doing cocaine. He started,
you know, cigarettes, a little marijuana, and then a little bit of this, and then a
little bit of that, and he grew. Then he went to crystal meth and this and that. It just got
so bad, and if you become numb, here's the hope: You're going to be okay.
If you ask Jesus for help, He can break any addiction. I want to read to you 1 Corinthians
10:13 because God delights in setting you free from an addiction. You might be feeling, “Oh man,
I got to confess my sin, and it's such a burden.” I don't know like, you know, if I ask God for
forgiveness then I do it again tomorrow, I’m really bad. That's why a lot of people actually
don't become Christians, because they actually think that they have to stop an addiction before
they become a Christian, right? What we can understand is Jesus delights in rescuing us from
our sins, and in our sins they're our addictions as well. He doesn't come and point the finger and
say, “See, you can't do it. No, that's the devil. Jesus says, You know you can't do this without Me.
With man it's impossible, but with Me, all things are possible, right? And I just want to read right
now that scripture again 1 Corinthians 10:13, “No temptation has overtaken
you that is not common to man. God is faithful. and He will not let
you be tempted beyond your ability.” I’m going to stop there. The addictions that you
have, right, I think the devil isn't that creative when you look at the world history, and how
he's designed the temptations that he's created false in. I think he's just pretty persistent
more than creative pornography, lust, drugs, alcohol. It's been here for thousands of years.
It's the same thing. It's been common to man. Addictions didn't just happen in 2000 or 1950
or 1800s. We're talking thousands of years, so #1 - What you're going through is not a
surprise to any man, any counselor, okay? And it's definitely not a surprise to God.
God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. Well, God is
faithful, and He knows how much we can bear, and we know that when we're relying on our own
strength, we might fail, but beyond our ability, He can give us the power. It's His strength,
not yours that's the supernatural delight in knowing Jesus as my Lord and Savior that
anything can be broken in Jesus name. I’m going to continue reading, so let's go. “…and
He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability but with the temptation He will also provide the
way of escape that you may be able to endure it.” What does that mean? God's not going to help us
be void of temptation. Temptation comes to us all. No one's immune to sin. We all sin daily. We
know that, but we also die to ourselves daily. Lord God, help me today to do what
You want me to do. Help me today to not do what You don't want me to do, but what I hope is that God knows the temptations.
He's not surprised. He loves you just the same, okay? And His love will never change. God is
faithful. He will never change His love for you. You can scream at Him. You can swear in Him,
you can run a million miles away from Him, but He's going to pursue you because you're
His. Your’re His only you, if that makes sense. There's only one Nick. I’m the only Nick
Vujicic of God’s, right? Does that make sense? When you're a parent, it'll make a little bit
more sense of how much He loves you as a father, and He gives us a way to get out of those
temptations. He gives us that strength, and I’m going to give you now a couple technical things,
though, that you can do with practical measures to understand that, yes, God promises not
to tempt us beyond our ability to resist, and He promises to provide
us strength in our weakness. Let me just read quickly 2 Timothy
2:22, “Flee also from youthful lusts, but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with
those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.” I want to tell you that, yes, God's there,
and He's waiting and He will do His part, but you need to instigate and ask. You
need to have a posture of the heart today to say, “Yes, Lord, I admit that this is what's
going on, and I can't do this on my own. I know You love me just the way that I am, but I want to
be free of this. I know that every time I do that, and then I want more, and I want money, but
then I want more money, and then I get this, and it's not enough, there is this void in
our soul that can only be filled with the King of kings, the Lord of Lords, so here's some
five practical steps for you to walk with Jesus and have Him unchain you from your addictions.
#1 is pray before you're tempted. So there were times in my life I would
actually—don't tell your parents that I’m telling you this—if you're a teenager, “Nick told me to do
it.” I got a Sharpie, and I put on my wall in my bedroom some words, and I first said to
myself, “You stupid idiot” to myself. “Don't you dare leave this room without prayer and
that's how I did it.” Some of us have a wristband. Some of us have a routine of prayer. I’m
telling you right now if you don't, you need it. It's when you put on the armor that before
that temptation comes you're already armed up. You're on the defense, knowing there's an
attack coming sometime today, but by God's grace you're going to trust Him. He's going
to protect you when we go through addiction. #2 is we need to remind ourselves of not
just the beauty and power of Jesus, but also, I’m going to say, the results of sin. It's not
just the implications of your addiction. “Oh, you're going to do this? All your body?
This no in your spirit, in your soul, the consequences of sin are real. We can ignore
them. We can bury them, and some people have done that where they don't feel that what they're doing
is wrong at all because they've justified it, but we need to go back to, “What does God feel
and say?” and know when we go through that so we must remind ourselves of the consequences
and not just us but the people around us. You're a leader. People see what you do. People see what
you don't do, People see what you say. People see what you don't say. You're also influencing other
people around you. God's created you and put you in that sphere of influence for a reason, but
not to be a megaphone of sin or an encourager of people to continue their addictions either. We are
here as a light in the dark place, and my friend, you will not be continually addicted in
where you're at if you ask Jesus to help you. So when you pray and you remind yourself of the
raw consequences of sin when you are tempted, #3 Run! If it's something is on the
computer, don't go to the computer. Fast from the computer. Do prayer and fasting
in other ways if you're really serious about your dream to become free of addiction.
Then it's time to get real and serious. God's ready, and He can help you, but
sometimes it's you helping yourself in. If there is some situation and some atmosphere
or some people that you continually go into just like a trap, don't go there. Don't talk to them.
Be proactive. That way, change your situation. #4 Rehearse Scripture. Focusing on God
is everything. Sometimes you need a verse just to get through this. Find the verse that
God wants you to repeat over and over and over say that even out loud as you repeat a verse of
Scripture. I love Philippians 4:13, “For I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
Amen! Sometimes I had to find myself in struggles just saying it out loud, and when you hear it,
your spirit awakens. You're allowing the Holy Spirit to dwell in you and empower you.
Lastly (#5), you can phone a friend. Call someone. Confide in someone. It's okay if you
need to go through a program, a 12-step program. It's good. It's awesome! Hey, God uses
dentists for my teeth, doesn't He? Do I just pray that my teeth are clean? No, you
brush your teeth, and when I have a root canal, does He expect me to do it on my own or me
wake up and my root canals good? No, I go to a dentist. Psychologists and counselors have helped
me along the way, and I’ve never done this alone. Yes, God's with me, but sometimes He also delights
in using His children to also help His other kids to get through their problems. So would you use
those five steps? Would you give your broken pieces a chance? Right now maybe there's something
that has happened in your life that's caused this. Maybe someone did something to you, said something
to you, and you can't shake it off. Maybe it's stuff that's all in your head, and you're
beating yourself up and you're digging yourself a hole. You can't get out of. There is no
soul that's too far gone for Jesus to rescue. Let me say it again, there's no soul gone too
far, too far away from the reach of Jesus. No, all things are possible because of His power
and His love, and He powerfully loves you if you have an addiction.
I would like to say a prayer for you right now. Let's pray.
Dear Lord Jesus, we thank you so much that You sit on the throne, that there is nothing that
you cannot do. There is no sin that You cannot forgive, and Lord, you love us no matter what.
We thank you, Lord, that You have a plan for us, and You've got the best things in store. The
best is yet to come. The better days are ahead, and, Lord God, for those of us who've
maybe got struck down in 2020 emotionally, spiritually, mentally, physically, well
God, we thank You that You're the Rescuer. We thank you, Lord, that You have given us the
truth in the word that nothing of this world can ever satisfy our soul, and no one can ever
experience the greatest peace of all without You. God, we pray right now against every
power and principality of darkness. We say, “Be gone in Jesus name!” and we ask God
that You break the yokes of these addictions. Give us courage to do those five steps.
Give us courage to call a friend. Give us the Scriptures to hold onto. Help us, Lord
God. Awaken our soul to a new rawness of the reality and the consequences of
sin. Help us, Lord God, to be a light, but Lord, right now, we thank you. Break
those addictions right now and help us to be who you want us to be, more like You so that
others would know you, too. In Jesus name. Amen. You know, if you're watching me right now
or listening, and you don't know what a personal relationship is with Jesus, then I
can guarantee, you don't have what I have. I’m not scared to death of death because I’m
already living forever! I know that when Jesus went on the cross, He died for all of my sins, and
all of my addictions, and when I gave my life to Jesus Christ, it didn't mean that Nick didn't
get depressed sometimes, or anxious, or fear, or struggling. Some sinners, sometimes, you grow,
you mature, you go on the journey with Jesus, and I just want you to know that some of you haven't
said, “Yes” to Jesus because you feel that, “Well, I need to be a better Christian. I need to stop
saying the F word. I need to stop smoking. I need to blah…blah…blah before I come to Jesus.”
No, He says, “Come as you are, and I will give you life. I will give you
peace. Joy. and strength beyond measure. Are you tired? Are you quite done yet trying
to put trust and faith in your own intellect, and your own discipline, in your own
positive attitude? Don't surrender.” Let Him take over. If you'd like to do
that, let's say your prayer right now. Dear Lord Jesus, You know who I am. You
know what I’ve done, and you still love me. Thank you for your love. I ask God for you
to come into my life. Forgive me of my sins. I give you my heart, my brokenness,
my depression. Take over my mind, take my addictions, take my burdens, and cares.
Help me Lord to know You're with me that You have a plan. Thank you, Jesus, for dying on the cross.
I believe You rose again and You died for my sins. I believe, Jesus, You are the Son of God, and
You love me. God, I want to know Your plan, Your peace, and Your strength. Fill me with
your Holy Spirit that I may live the life that You want for me. Thank you, God,
that I’m not alone, and You're with me forever. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
Friend, I’m so glad that if you did say that prayer, that we can hear from you. As
a team, we would love to actually give you, right now, some resources to help you over the
next seven days. I want to tell you that you can get your phone out right now, and I’m going
to give you a number to text because we want to continue to encourage you in your faith journey
with Jesus Christ. The number to text is 66866, and if you text the word Jesus or click the
link below, you'll get some encouragement along the way to boost your strength in knowing
more about God and how much He loves you. Also, if you would like to give towards the
ministry of Life Without Limbs, we can't do what we do without supporters to learn more about
us. Thank you for prayerfully considering becoming a supporter and a partner at LifeWithoutLimbs.org.
Please join us next month for our Relentless Series, and I ask you to actually invite someone
else to join you because if you got something out of today, I can guarantee that in the
sphere of influence that God's given you. You might be able to see
and witness a seed of faith planted in a loved one's life as well.
Love you so much! I’ll see you next time. Thank you for joining us this month for
Relentless. If you need prayer, you can send us a prayer request or chat online with one of our
trained coaches through our website. To watch any of our previous Relentless videos, you can find
them on the Life Without Limbs YouTube Channel. If you are new to a relationship with Jesus
or you just want to grow on your faith, check out Life Without Limbs resources, either the
book Unstoppable or one of our daily devotionals. For more information about our ministry
visit us online at LifeWithoutLimbs.org. We're so happy you joined us, and we look
forward to seeing you next month for Relentless!
