Seven Common Reasons for Relapse

Before we jump back into Step 4 and the Personal Inventory, I want to share with you some very helpful insights from the Celebrate Recovery manual. This is certainly something to think about all the time. Below are 7 common reasons people relapse and some ways to aviod it...

You have not completely done or even bought into the previous step. We want instant success, immediate results, and recovery yesterday, but it doesn’t work that way. We have built our addictions and idols over years but recovery takes time, effort, and most of all, cooperation with God. What we can do right now is choose to do what it takes, and daily make that same choice. You can’t skip or rush ahead on the steps and think you’ll just the bare minimum to get you through. You especially cannot skip steps 1-4! Galatians 5:25 says, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”

You have not truly surrendered your life and will to Christ’s care and control (step 3). You want God to fix your problem, but then you want Him to leave you alone. You are not willing to give yourself to Him, to love and to serve. That means you are choosing to be on your own. In Joshua 23-24, there is a review of all God had done for Israel when He led them out of Egypt through Moses (and by the way, 1 Cor 10 says these things happened as an example to us). God won their battles, drove out their enemies who were given over to idolatry, false gods, and all kinds of evil according to God. ThenJoshua 23:11 says, “Therefore take careful heed to yourselves, that you love the Lord your God.” In verse 12 and beyond it says that if you don’t love and serve God, but go back to the idols and false gods, God will not fight for you anymore. The reality is that God will fight your battles, but only if you love and give yourself to Him.

You have not accepted God’s forgiveness, possible only through Jesus. You think your sin is too big to be forgiven; that lie keeps you defeated and keeps you from trusting God. 1 John 1:9 says,“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

You have not truly forgiven others who have harmed you. Until you decide to forgive them, you will be a prisoner to anger, resentment, frustration, and hate. Proverbs 10:18 says, “He who conceals his hatred has lying lips, and whoever spreads slander is a fool.” 1 John 2:9 says, “anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness.” 1 John 3:15 says, “Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.” Galatians 5:5 says, “If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out! Or you will be destroyed by one another.

You are afraid of the risk in making necessary changes. You are paralyzed by fear of failure – which guarantees it. Resisting God and the changes He wants to make for fear of the unknown. So you choose the hurt and habit which is what you do know. Maybe you stopped for fear of rejection or being hurt again. Deuteronomy 31:6 says, “Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.” Psalm 118:6 says, “The Lord is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me?”

You are not willing to own your responsibility. You shift blame instead of taking responsibility which means you’ll never deal with truth. Psalm 139:23-24 says, “Search me , O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”

You have not developed an effective support team. You have no accountability partners, no sponsor, maybe a church family but that’s only an hour or so a week, maybe CR a couple hours a week. Yet you have lots of time with those old places, people who lead you into temptation, and time alone. That is a sure recipe for relapse and failure. Galatians 6:2-3 says, “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.”