Children of Alcoholics

"Children of alcoholics, according to experts, are all but forced to learn early on that they can’t control what they can’t control — but that they very much must control what they can. They can learn to manage around a person who can’t be managed. They can learn to make and keep a kind of order in situations that are marked by the utter lack thereof. They can learn to make themselves invaluable, or invisible — and when to be the former, and when to be the latter. They can be, and can grow up to be, quiet and competitive, persistent and resilient, achievers and survivors, and keen, intuitive readers of rooms and moods and needs. They can be compulsive pleasers of people and in particular one person — a person whose needs trump those of others and certainly their own. They can be helpers. They can be enablers. They can be both."

By grace, God can take the results of a tough childhood and use them for good in our lives.

The Love of Christ for Us

 

The Love of Christ for us

He loves us:

Eternally-

In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will.

Ephesians 1:4b-6

Preemptively-

We love because He first love us. 

I John 4:19

But God demonstrates His own love for us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 

Romans 5:8

 

Totally (at max capacity)

Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He would depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the uttermost. 

John 13:1

 

Sacrificially-

Greater love has no man than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.

John 15:13

Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ Jesus loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma. 

Ephesians 5:2

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

Galatians 2:20

Specially-

Greater love has no man than this, that one lay down himself for his friends. You are my friends is you do what I command you.

John 15:13-14

I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even a You have loved me.

John17:23

See how great a love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are.

I John 3:1

But the lovingkindness of the Lord is everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to children's children, to those who keep His covenant and remember His precepts to do them.

Psalm 103:17-18

Expressively-

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of His benefits; who pardons all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases; who redeems your soul from the pit, who crowns you with lovingkindness and compassion; who satisfies your years with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle. 

Psalm 103:2-5

Righteously-

The Lord performs righteous deeds and judgments for all who are oppressed. He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the sons of Israel. The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness. He will not always strive with us, nor will He keep His anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so great is His lovingkindness to those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. 

Psalm 103:6-12

Tenderly-

Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him. For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust. 

Psalm 103:13-14

Tenaciously-

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:38-39

The Seriousness of Man's Spiritual Plight

What is man's spiritual condition? He is hopelessly, irretrievably, and inescapably lost. He is so lost he does not know he is lost. Lost people do now know they are lost. I believe that most Christians don't realize how lost they were and the seriousness of man's lost condition. 

Why are men so lost?

First, all men are spiritually held captive by Satan.  

II Timothy 2:24-26 The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been help captive by him to do his will. 

I John 5:19 We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.

Second, all men are spiritually blind. 

II Corinthians 4:3-4 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they may not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God. 

John 12:46 I have come as Light into the world, so that everyone who believes in Me will not remain in darkness. 

Third, all men are spiritually dead. 

Ephesians 2:1-2, 4-5 And you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when were were dead in our transgressions made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).

John 10:28 and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish-ever;...

Fourth, all men are slaves of sin.

Romans 6:6-7 knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.

Romans 6:18 and having been freed from sin, you became slaves to righteousness. 

Fifth, all men are enemies of God, and therefore oppose God. 

Romans 1:28-32 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unliving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

Romans 8:7 for the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so. 

Romans 5:10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 

What is the remedy God has provided for man's spiritual plight? Jesus Christ, through His life, death, and resurrection. How do you receive eternal life through Christ? Turn from your sin and rebellion against God, and by faith trust in all that God has done in and through Jesus Christ.