My name is Pete and I am very much a believer in Jesus and I am also very much an alcoholic. As an alcoholic believer I have struggled with all the tough questions. First know this about me; I am no average, mild, or temperate problem drinker who decided to quit just before the bottom fell out and managed to walk away with only minor cuts and bruises. Don't get me wrong now, I have heard of such men, and had I not known better by now I would demand to know their secret! I myself happen to be a low bottom, high gravity, 100 proof, lost it all twice and then did it again alcoholic.
I have been a believer for almost 10 years, and for most of those I have been caught up in a vicious cycle of homelessness, detoxes, psyche wards, incarceration, and rehabs. Sometimes but not always in that order. It would have been possible during my active addiction to walk by me sitting at a bus stop and see that I was unkempt, intoxicated, malnourished, dehydrated, lost, and acutely homeless. But you also might note the Cross necklace dangling from my neck and the bracelet that says Jesus and wonder how someone so apparently and deeply afflicted by addiction could claim to currently have a relationship with God? And if so then how come this so called relationship has not manifested itself into some kind of restoration or semblance of hope? How come God hasn't helped me get sober? Why did He make me an alcoholic of this magnitude in the first place? Is God even there? Does God even care? Many nights I sat somewhere drinking myself into another stupor asking myself these same questions.
That's why I'm here to tell you that I have been brought back from a helpless state of body and mind. I have come to believe that not only is God there, but that God does care tremendously. He knows all your pains and heartaches and all your joys and victories. God knows you better than you know yourself! Please don't get me wrong. I am no spiritual guru. I know very little. I do have some insight through what God has revealed to me but it is not answers that I intend to share with you. It is experience, because it is experience that I have an abundance of. Through this blog I plan to go more in depth about how my faith has been tested, broken, and restored through the many failures and victories I have experienced as a Christian alcoholic. It is beautifully brutal, it is tragic, it is paradoxical, it is wonderful, it is inspiring, and because it brought me closer to God I wouldn't have it any other way!
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