Addictions
A Royal Priesthood
James E. Faust
April 2006
1. I counsel
all of you brethren to avoid every kind of addiction. At this time Satan and
his followers are enslaving some of our choicest young people through addiction
to alcohol, all kinds of drugs, pornography,
tobacco, gambling, and other compulsive disorders. Some people seem to be born
with a weakness for these substances so that only a single experimentation will
result in uncontrollable addiction. Some addictions are actually mind-altering
and create a craving that overpowers reason and judgment. These addictions
destroy the lives not only of those who do not resist them but also their
parents, spouses, and children. As the prophet Jeremiah lamented, “The kings of
the earth, and all the inhabitants of the world, would not have believed that
the adversary and the enemy should have entered into the gates.” 15
The Lord in
His wisdom has warned us that substances that are not good for us should be
totally avoided. We have been warned not to take the first drink, smoke the
first cigarette, or try the first drug. Curiosity and peer pressure are selfish
reasons to dabble with addictive substances. We should stop and consider the
full consequences, not just to ourselves and our futures, but also to our loved
ones. These consequences are physical, but they also risk the loss of the
Spirit and cause us to fall prey to Satan.
James E.
Faust
The Power To Change
October 2007
(written just before he passed away)
2. Another kind
of change I wish to address is recovery from enslaving habits. They include
disorders associated with alcohol, drugs, tobacco, eating, gambling, unworthy
sexual behavior, and viewing pornography. I
quote from a recently published book on debilitating addictions: “Substance
abuse is a leading cause of preventable illness and death in the United States.
The misuse of drugs ruins families, costs billions in lost productivity,
strains the healthcare system, and ends lives.” 4 It is
a curse on society.
3. There are
many kinds of addictions, and it is difficult for someone who has one of these
serious addictions to change because some of them are mind-altering. A recent
article on addiction said, “In the brains of addicts, there is reduced activity
in the prefrontal cortex, where rational thought can override impulse
behavior.” 5 Some addictions can control us to the point where they
take away our God-given agency. One of Satan’s great tools is to find ways to
control us. Consequently, we should abstain from anything that would keep us
from fulfilling the Lord’s purposes for us, whereby the blessings of eternity
may hang in jeopardy. We are in this life for the spirit to gain control over
the body rather than the other way around.
4. Any kind of addiction inflicts a terrible
price in pain and suffering, and it can even affect us spiritually. However,
there is hope because most addictions can over time be overcome. We can change,
but it will be difficult.
We
begin by making a decision to change. It takes courage and humility to admit
that we need help, but few, if any of us, can do it on our own. The Church has
an addiction recovery program that has been adapted from the original Twelve
Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous into a framework of the doctrines and beliefs of
the Church. These 12 steps are found in A Guide to Addiction Recovery and
Healing, which is available to priesthood leaders and other members.
A complete
change in lifestyle may be necessary. We must desire with all our hearts,
minds, and strength to overcome these harmful addictions. We must be prepared
to renounce totally and absolutely our participation in any of these addictive
substances or practices.
5. “The gospel
changed my heart, my appearance, my attitude, and my feelings. And I learned to
pray. Whenever I have a problem, I go to Heavenly Father and say, ‘Help me.’
And he sees me through it. … Now when I walk, I walk with my head high because
I know Heavenly Father’s beside me every step of the way. …
6. Each new day
that dawns can be a new day for us to begin to change. We can change our
environment. We can change our lives by substituting new habits for old. We can
mold our character and future by purer thoughts and nobler actions. As someone
once put it, “The possibility of change is always there, with its hidden
promise of peace, happiness, and a better way of life.” 7
7. Addictions are offensive to the Spirit. While
some addictions require professional clinical help, let us not overlook the
spiritual help available to us through priesthood
blessings and through prayer. The Lord has promised us, “My grace is
sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble
themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become
strong unto them” (Ether 12:27).
Let us remember that the power to change is very real, and it is a great
spiritual gift from God.
Becoming
Provident Providers Temporally and Spiritually
Elder Robert
D. Hales
April 2009
8. Today I
speak to all whose freedom to choose has been diminished by the effects of
ill-advised choices of the past. I speak specifically of choices that have led
to excessive debt and addictions to food, drugs, pornography, and
other patterns of thought and action that diminish one’s sense of self-worth.
All of these excesses affect us individually and undermine our family relationships.
9. Our
challenges, including those we create by our own decisions, are part of our
test in mortality. Let me assure you that your situation is not beyond the
reach of our Savior. Through Him, every struggle can be for our experience and
our good (see D&C 122:7).
Each temptation we overcome is to strengthen us, not destroy us. The Lord will
never allow us to suffer beyond what we can endure (see 1 Corinthians
10:13).
10. We must remember that the adversary knows us
extremely well. He knows where, when, and how to tempt us. If we are obedient
to the promptings of the Holy Ghost, we can learn
to recognize the adversary’s enticements. Before we yield to temptation, we
must learn to say with unflinching resolve, “Get thee behind me, Satan” (Matthew 16:23).
11.
Our success is never measured by how strongly we are tempted but
by how faithfully we respond. We must ask for help from our Heavenly Father and
seek strength through the Atonement of His Son, Jesus Christ. In both temporal
and spiritual things, obtaining this divine assistance enables us to become provident
providers for ourselves and others.
Addiction or Freedom
Elder Russell M. Nelson
October 1988
12.
But I raise my voice with others throughout the world who warn
against abuse of drugs beyond prescribed limits, and the recreational or social
use of chemical substances so often begun naively by the ill-informed.
From
an initial experiment thought to be trivial, a vicious cycle may follow. From
trial comes a habit. From habit comes dependence. From dependence comes
addiction. Its grasp is so gradual. Enslaving shackles of habit are too small
to be sensed until they are too strong to be broken. Indeed, drugs are the
modern “mess of pottage” for which souls are sold. No families are free from
risk.
13. Last year, a
tragic milestone was reached. More Americans had been killed from
alcohol-related motor vehicle accidents (1,350,000) than had been killed in all
the wars America has ever fought (1,156,000). 10
14. We reach out in love to family, friends, and
neighbors, regardless of nationality or creed, who suffer addiction. The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints continues to help relieve this international plague.
15. The solution to this problem ultimately is
neither governmental nor institutional. Nor is it a question of legality. It is
a matter of individual choice and commitment. Agency must be understood. The
importance of the will in making crucial choices must be known. Then steps
toward relief can follow.
16. Agency, or the power to choose, was ours as
spirit children of our Creator before the world was. (See Alma 13:3;
Moses 4:4.)
It is a gift from God, nearly as precious as life itself.
Often,
however, agency is misunderstood. While we are free to choose, once we have
made those choices, we are tied to the consequences of those choices.
We
are free to take drugs or not. But once we choose to use a habit-forming drug,
we are bound to the consequences of that choice. Addiction surrenders later
freedom to choose. Through chemical means, one can literally become
disconnected from his or her own will!
17.
Each one who resolves to climb that steep road to recovery must
gird up for the fight of a lifetime. But a lifetime is a prize well worth the
price.
18.
Spiritual Prescription
My
spiritual prescription includes six choices which I shall list alphabetically,
A through F, and then comment about each:
. 1. Choose to Be Alive. Seek beloved
family, friends, and physicians. Plead for their help. Your precious life is at
stake. Cheer up your hearts, and remember that ye are free to act for
yourselves—to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of eternal life.
(See 2 Ne. 10:23.) The choice for life brings an outlook of optimism. It
breathes hope. It rekindles self-esteem—regarding one’s body as a timeless
trust. And it awakens a personal commitment to “see that ye take care of these
sacred things, … that ye look to God and live.” (Alma 37:47.)
2. Choose to Believe. Believe in God.
Accept yourself as His child, created in His image. He loves you and wants you
to be happy. He wants you to grow through life’s choices and become more like
Him. He pleads that you will “reconcile [yourself] to the will of God, and not
to the will of the … flesh.” (2 Ne. 10:24.)
. 3. Choose to
Change. “How long will ye suffer [yourself] to be led by foolish and blind
guides? Yea, how long will ye choose darkness rather than light?” (Hel. 13:29.)
Choose to change—today!
“The
spirit and the body are the soul of man.” (D&C 88:15.)
Both spirit and body have appetites. One of life’s great challenges is to
develop dominance of spiritual appetites over those that are physical. Your
willpower becomes strong when joined with the will of the Lord.
. 4. Choose to Be Different. Distinguish
yourself from worldly crowds. Defenders do not resemble offenders. Among them
are clever merchandisers who plot to link beer with sports, tobacco with charm,
and drugs with fun. Scripture warns of those who so deceive:
. 5. Choose to Exercise. Exercising the body
and the spirit will aid in the climb toward recovery. Appropriate physical
activity helps to combat depression, which so often accompanies addiction.
But
spiritual exercise is even more crucial. This battle will be more easily won
with fervent prayer. If we truly “counsel with the Lord in all [our] doings, …
he will direct [us] for good.” (Alma 37:37.)
Strength
comes from uplifting music,
good books, and feasting from the scriptures. Since the Book of Mormon was to come forth “when
there shall be great pollutions upon the face of the earth” (Morm. 8:31),
study of that book in particular will fortify us. President Benson has issued
that challenge.
Exercise
the body and the spirit and choose to exercise faith in God.
. 6. Choose to Be Free. Break “bands of
iniquity.” (Mosiah 23:12; see also 1 Ne. 13:5.) Leave behind “an iron yoke, …
handcuffs, and chains, and shackles, and fetters of hell.” (D&C 123:8.)
Choose
to be free from feigned friends who first flatter yet later despise. (See D&C 121:20.)
Drug abuse may have started with them, but you pay the price.
Oh, That
Cunning Plan of the Evil One
M. Russell
Ballard
October 2010
19. The use of artificial lures to fool and catch
a fish is an example of the way Lucifer often tempts, deceives, and tries to
ensnare us.
Like
the fly fisherman who knows that trout are driven by hunger, Lucifer knows our
“hunger,” or weaknesses, and tempts us with counterfeit lures which, if taken,
can cause us to be yanked from the stream of life into his unmerciful
influence. And unlike a fly fisherman who catches and releases the fish
unharmed back into the water, Lucifer will not voluntarily let go. His goal is
to make his victims as miserable as he is.
20. I add my voice today to the voices of my
Brethren that Lucifer is a clever and cunning intelligence. One of the main
methods he uses against us is his ability to lie and deceive to convince us
that evil is good and good is evil. Right from the very beginning in the great
Council in Heaven, Satan “sought to destroy the agency of man, which I, the
Lord God, had given him. …
21. The battle over man’s God-given agency
continues today. Satan and his minions have their lures all around us, hoping
that we will falter and take his flies so he can reel us in with counterfeit
means. He uses addiction to steal away agency. According to the dictionary,
addiction of any kind means to surrender to something, thus relinquishing
agency and becoming dependent on some life-destroying substance or behavior. 1
22. There is also great concern about some of the
pernicious, addictive behaviors like gambling and evil pornography that
are so personally destructive and so rampant in our society. Remember, brothers
and sisters, any kind of addiction is to surrender to something, thus
relinquishing agency and becoming dependent. Thus, video-gaming and texting on
cell phones need to be added to the list. Some gamers claim to spend up to 18
hours a day going through level after level of video games, neglecting all
other aspects of their lives. Texting on cell phones can become an addiction,
causing the important interpersonal human communication to become lost. Not
long ago a bishop told me two of his youth were standing side by side texting
one another rather than talking to each other.
23. Medical research describes addiction as “a
disease of the brain.” 4 This is true, but I believe
that once Satan has someone in his grasp, it also becomes a disease of the
spirit. But no matter what addictive cycle one is caught in, there is always
hope.
24. To those who are dealing with an addiction
personally or within your family, I repeat, fervent prayer is key to gaining
the spiritual strength to find peace and overcome an addictive craving.
Heavenly Father loves all of His children, so thank Him and express sincere
faith in Him. Ask Him for the strength to overcome the addiction you are
experiencing. Set aside all pride and turn your life and your heart to Him. Ask
to be filled with the power of Christ’s pure love. You may have to do this many
times, but I testify to you that your body, mind, and spirit can be transformed,
cleansed, and made whole, and you will be freed. Jesus said, “I am the light of
the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the
light of life” (John 8:12).
25. I have seen the marvelous blessing of
recovery that can set one free from the chains of addiction. The Lord is our
Shepherd, and we shall not want as we trust in the power of the Atonement. I
know the Lord can and will free the addicted from their bondage, for as the
Apostle Paul proclaimed, “I can do all things through Christ which
strengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:13).
I pray, my brothers and sisters, that this may be so with those who may be
struggling with this challenge at this time in their lives, and do so humbly in
the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
.
