When I was at uni I had a Coke addiction (the wholesome bubbly soft-drink kind, rather than the narcotic kind ). I used to consume some ridiculous quantity per day – breakfast, lunch, dinner or any time in between. I’d squeeze one in between lectures, and often have one in my hand as I travelled from place to place. I’d get on the train for a 2 hour train trip and consume 1.25 litres… and then get another one on the far end! In one night, preparing an end-of-semester lab report, I consumed 5.25 litres of Coke… about 8am the next morning I stumbled up campus to hand it in, before returning to my college room, laying down on my bed and convulsing for a while, as my stomach acids did their work! (Don’t try this at home, kids.)

There came a time when I decided that I should try to ‘de-tox’. Quite apart from the amount of money I was spending, my sleeping patterns were really starting to suffer, to the point where I never actually felt ‘rested’ – the pall of fatigue hung over me all the time. So I decided to go cold-turkey.

The trouble was, however, that not drinking Coke had all kinds of consequences: the first and most obvious was that I started to experience crippling headaches. These lasted a week or so, after which I began to feel better. ‘The worst is over,’ I thought… but I was wrong.

You see, I had overcome the physical cravings, but the habits of several years were still ingrained: in my head, I ‘needed’ Coke in order to study; I would enter a take-away shop and head directly for the refrigerator; drinks tables at parties and weddings were particularly tempting, because I could convince myself that so long as I didn’t have to pay for it… etc.

Sin works the same way. The Apostle Paul says:

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

- Romans 7:14-20

Why do we continue to sin, even after we become followers of Christ? I believe (and this is only my opinion, as I am not sure that the Bible is entirely clear on this point) that it is because we have been freed from the power of sin but not yet the habit of sin.

Jesus, through his sacrifice on the Cross, has conquered sin; he has dealt with the consequences of sin; as a result we can be in a right relationship with God. The physical cravings for sin have been overcome. We are now in Christ, rather than in the world.

However we are not yet made perfect. We still fall back into old habits. The patterns of my old life are so deeply intertwined with who I am, where I go, who I hang out with, and the way I think that they slip past my guard… before I know it I have reverted to the old way, even though in my head I know better.

As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.

- Proverbs 26:11

There is an entire industry of so-called ‘self-help’ books, showing you how to reform our lives in various ways: seven habits for more effective living; overcoming temptation in 32.5 easy steps; how psycho-therapy changed my life etc. Groups like Alcoholics Anonymous and others offer twelve-step programs to assist people in overcoming addiction, and these are no doubt valuable. On the whole, however, we human beings are not good at reforming ourselves; when it comes to sin, ‘self-help’ is actually ‘no-help’.

Fortunately for us, there is a better way. God is the only person with a proven track record when it comes to turning lives around. He offers believers his Holy Spirit to effect transformational change in our lives. (Oh, if you want the fancy-schmancy word for this process, it is ‘sanctification’.)

Hi, my name is Tim, and I am a sinner. If you, like me, are struggling to overcome the addiction of sin then the best thing you can do is cry out to God and ask him to work in your life to destroy the habits that lead you back to your old life. That is the kind of prayer that God loves to answer! The next best thing you can do is ask a Christian friend to support you, and to hold you accountable. There is no shame in asking for help – after all, we are all sinners here!