I could have titled this “How to stop smoking cigarettes without quitting”. That’s what happened to me. I call it my ‘Red Sea’ experience. Actually, its just one of my ‘Red Sea’ experiences, but it was monumental.
It was a miracle! I had an experience with my ‘Red Sea’ that spanned a couple decades before the sea finally parted under the power, Love, grace and mercy of God. For over twenty years I longed for and prayed for deliverance from smoking.
Gum, patches, will power, laying on of hands, ‘casting out’, etc. Nothing worked. But I was getting older and increasingly concerned about my health and the effects of a lifetime of smoking cigarettes catching up with me. My daughter pleaded for me to quit and I couldn’t blame her, but the pressure was horrible since I didn’t have the means to end this. I was really desperate.
One evening I just got down on my knees and without a big prayerful production, told God how I felt about it all and that I just wanted to quit. I was putting the cigarettes down and asked for whatever it would take to keep me from picking them up again.
This was a form of will power at this point, I suppose, but I submitted to God’s mercy and was being quite up front with God about it.
It became more difficult as the evening went on, to not want to go back to the public trashcan I had thrown my remaining packs of cigarettes into and light one up again. I had even thrown my ashtray and lighter away as well. I would have had to buy cigarettes and a lighter again just to have another smoke. But I held out through the night.
The next morning I was driving over to a friend’s house. It felt like someone was choking me while I was driving. Although I could breathe, my throat felt so constricted. I wanted a cigarette then and there almost more than I had ever wanted one. Just to make this feeling go away. I assumed it was withdrawal.
The closer I was to my friend’s house, where I was to spend the better part of the day, the choking sensation grew worse. I couldn’t take it anymore. I pulled into the parking lot of a convenience store.
Tears were rolling down my cheeks. I didn’t want another quitting attempt to be a failure. What hope is there if NOTHING works? In my car, and in tears, I told God I needed Him to BE GOD, right then and there. I looked over at the convenience store and said “God, I need you to do something really ‘God like’ to help me, because if you don’t I have to go to that store and buy some cigarettes right now. There’s nothing else I can do. I can’t even stop myself from buying them if you don’t help me.”
Impulsively I grabbed for my bible that I had tucked in the back seat. I didn’t know what else to do. I opened randomly and the pages fell open to Galatians 6:8. If you sow to the flesh you will reap corruption. If you sow to the Spirit you will reap eternal life (health, freedom, etc).
These were familiar scriptures I had read a hundred times. Believing I perfectly understood what it meant, I recalled this was the same scripture the Holy Spirit had been whispering to me, very far off in the back of my mind, for a few months. I didn’t know what specifically it was pertaining to during that time and I just let Him whisper it all He wanted. I trusted He would make it clear to me when the time came.
Well, the time came!
Something in me ‘snapped’ the moment I read the scripture. I don’t know what it was. It wasn’t a new revelation I was aware of, nor further insight into the words, but I did know that at that moment the Lord gave me whatever I needed to leave that parking lot without getting more cigarettes. He also gave me what I needed to make it through the rest of the day. The next day He gave me all I needed to make it through that day, and the next and so on. So God had ‘stopped’ me from smoking, but I have never had to quit. (I guess, at that moment, I had sown to the Spirit and God let it be known to me).
Quitting implies that I had the power within myself to actually quit. But I didn’t have what I needed to quit. God ‘stopped’ me from smoking. Big difference. The difference is as big as Moses parting the sea himself or God doing it.
The struggle with the choking sensation continued for many weeks. Although uncomfortable, it was something I was able to deal with (His grace was sufficient), and I would still deal with it if it had never ceased, rather than go back to smoking. But it did eventually stop.
Coming up on 4 years smoke free I can hardly believe it has been that long since ‘the Red Sea’ parted. I usually go weeks, sometimes a month or more, without remembering I used to smoke. I have walked past smokers and smelled the smoke without remembering right away. My heavenly Father has put it so far behind me, it’s almost as though it was never there.
The liberty is a joy. The freedom is wonderful. The miracle I am so thankful for. The Lord gave me what I needed.
Why was this time different than all the other previous times I prayed for Him to help me? I don’t know. I don’t know if it was different. The timing was different. It was 20+ years into my smoking pastime. Maybe God had reason not to deliver me sooner. Maybe my heart wasn’t right the earlier times. He alone knows the depths of my heart. When I thought I was being sincere and at the end of myself before, maybe I really wasn’t.
I don’t think it was anything I did or didn’t do, though. It was God’s timing for His purpose. Remember the man born blind for the purpose of Christ to heal Him? I have asked God why and He hasn’t answered me on that question. But I trust Him that it has done a work in me, He makes all things work together for good and I trust Him.
May this be an encouragement to anyone struggling with a relentless situation or condition. No matter how low you go, He is still God. Sometimes we need to get out of the way enough for Him to exercise His love for us in ways that we can’t begin to assume.
As a friend recently put it, the Life of Christ (resurrection) within us overcomes the law of sin and death in us. Much like the laws of aerodynamics or buoyancy overcome the law of gravity. When we can trust the Love of God and the power of Christ within us to overcome the law of sin and death, I believe we will have discovered a freedom for which Christ has set us free!
dj
