Is Jesus an enabler?

[TheHem]

I’m not sure if this is the forum to post this but I recently had a conversation with my aunt who is concerned about her brother who is an alcoholic and sex addict. Certain families members have chosen to alienate him because they are very uncomfortable in his presence. So the response my aunt gave was that we shouldn’t shun him because we are ‘Christians and Christians don’t behave that way’ but without writing a novel here, I disagree. I think we must set up healthy boundaries when dealing with difficult issues as these. He refuses to change his life or make any effort to get better all the while his mother, my grandmother is choosing to give him a roof over his head and the creature comforts of life. She first off is the biggest enabler in the group and this would be one tough cookie to crack to convince her that she needs to kick him out. So what do we do as a family? Yes, I know pray but I believe there must be action with the prayer. And as to my post title, I know very well the Jesus Christ is NOT an enabler. I am hoping it will stir some wise counsel and scripture references to arm myself with when I have another conversation with either my aunt or mother about this mess in our family.

 

[St_Francis]

Yes, Christ did not want us to help people to do bad things, only good things.

I think that it will be very difficult for you to change anyone’s mind in this scenario. Your one relative is hooked on substances, and the other two are hooked on rescuing him.

You might consider going to Al-Anon; the people there will probably be able to help you understand the dynamics of the situation better.

Try to maintain as good relations as you can with all yoir relatives, but don’t get involved in the drama because it will not help and will be bad for you. Continue to pray, and understand that sometimes it is betterto do nothing and let God take care of it than it is to do something which just makes things worse.

 

[oneGODoneCHURCH]

I’m not sure if this is the forum to post this but I recently had a conversation with my aunt who is concerned about her brother who is an alcoholic and sex addict. Certain families members have chosen to alienate him because they are very uncomfortable in his presence. So the response my aunt gave was that we shouldn’t shun him because we are ‘Christians and Christians don’t behave that way’ but without writing a novel here, I disagree. I think we must set up healthy boundaries when dealing with difficult issues as these. He refuses to change his life or make any effort to get better all the while his mother, my grandmother is choosing to give him a roof over his head and the creature comforts of life. She first off is the biggest enabler in the group and this would be one tough cookie to crack to convince her that she needs to kick him out. So what do we do as a family? Yes, I know pray but I believe there must be action with the prayer. And as to my post title, I know very well the Jesus Christ is NOT an enabler. I am hoping it will stir some wise counsel and scripture references to arm myself with when I have another conversation with either my aunt or mother about this mess in our family.

Remind them that there is a differance between shunning and protecting oneself and children from someone that is possible of doing harm to them. Also remind them that though we are called to help when what we do to help goes so far as to allow the person to continue to harm themself we are no longer helping and must chang something about what we are doing. Good Luck and God Bless as I have been there and it came to the point that I told my family that the person involed if did not stop his use of drug that he was no longer welcome in my house and if I knew of him haveing them in his possion I would call the authorities to turn him in. Guess what? it never came to that, because once he realized that the gravy train was leaving and without him he got real help.
Stay strong.