Galatians 5:22,23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Does it get any more boring than that? Seriously, self-control is fine in theory but where's the thrill, the excitement, the edgeiness in a life lived that way?
It's been a couple of decades, but I still remember thinking that way. I remember living life on the edge, never knowing as I ordered my first drink whether I'd be going home or to jail at the end of the evening. Uncertainty was my normal, and while I never set out to get arrested it happened enough that it was never totally unanticipated. They say that what you do every day, day after day, is your normal. Uncertainty and chaos ruled my life for so many years during the insanity of my active alcoholism that when I finally, almost by accident, got sober I found it boring as hell.
One day early in my sobriety I asked an old-timer, "What do you do for fun around here? This is so boring." I smiled when he said, "John, You're not bored, you're calm." And he was right, for the first time in over twenty years I was not arrestible during a routine traffic stop, I might get a ticket but I wasn't going to jail. That underlying feeling of impending doom was gone. I wasn't a whole lot healthier mentally and spiritually, but my behavior and circumstances weren't dangerously chaotic anymore.
It took time, but today I desire love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in full-measure, life on the edge does not call to me. The absence of self-manufactured chaos is my new normal, and I thank God for that. I do not know why the Lord snatched me from the barstool while others were left to die, I just try to show gratitude for the mercy extended. "Here I am Lord, send me."
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