Dale Johnson: This week on a podcast, I have with me Dr. Mark Shaw. He’s a pastor of counseling at the Nocatee campus of First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida. He’s the founder of The Addiction Connection, a non-profit equipping ministry for addiction for biblical counselors. He’s the author of 28 Publications, including The Heart of Addiction, and the latest one, which we’re going to talk about today, called Destigmatizing Addiction: Hope Through the Gospel. His passion is to see local church offer compassionate biblical counseling to hurting souls. Mark, you’re familiar to many of our listeners. We are so glad that you’re with us to talk about this important booklet that you’ve released. Welcome to podcast today.
Mark Shaw: Thanks Dale. I’m grateful to be here.
Dale Johnson: Now, we could go a lot of different directions as we think about stigma. If we were to just talk on a plane secular level, Mark, and have this conversation, stigmas are probably the one-great-problem. Well, there are lots of problems in the mental health world, but this is one of the primary problems that the mental health world knows that they’ve created, and they don’t know how to get rid of it. Because at some point when you say that someone is abnormal, you create some level of stigmatization. I want us to dive in because you’re pinpointing this area in terms of addiction. You do a lot of addiction ministry, and so, I want us to explore this idea of stigmatization. What do we mean? Let’s start by describing it this way: God actually, I would say, hates this idea of stigma, in part because people are made in His image. So, describe in the booklet how you unpack this idea of stigmatization and why this would be something that’s disturbing to the heart of God.
Mark Shaw: Yeah, I totally agree. It’s an addiction issue. It’s a mental health issue. It’s both of those because of the terminology they’ve created, like you just said. They’ve created terminology and this created stigma. And I think when you talk about stigma, it really means to stain someone’s reputation. I think about proverbs 22:1, “A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches.” So, God obviously is giving us wisdom there about our reputation. And when you stigmatize people, it’s an attempt to make them less than human, you know, less than you. It’s a prideful thing to say, “Man, those drug addicts…” “or those bipolar…” You know? And people are typically looking down on someone when they stigmatize them. And I just believe, like you said, the Lord hates that. And the devil, when you think about diablos, is a slanderer. He’s falsely accusing the brethren, and gossip and all of that is slanderous to people’s character. So, I think it’s a big deal. And I think what’s great is we have the answer in the gospel, from the hope of Jesus Christ.
Dale Johnson: Yeah, I think that’s exactly right. It is interesting as you described, how the world created this idea of labeling. And as they create this idea of labeling, again describing something that’s abnormal: There was an unintended consequence of creating this idea of stigmatization. And again, if you go back and read the literature regarding mental health for its history, what you see is that this is has been one of the primary problems they’ve had to face. They’ve dumped billions and billions into PR programs to try and undo this idea of stigma—trying to normalize, you know, the labels that people have. So much so, that now we’re starting to go down a different direction with these ideas of stigma, to where now we’re saying we’re normalizing everyday life. In our medicalization of everyday life, we’re trying to normalize the problems that people have. Well, what that means then is now we’re not talking about abnormalities. We’re not talking about things that are distinct from what we typically experience in a given day. So, I want you to elaborate a little bit on how the world’s terminology actually creates a stigma for an individual rather than alleviates it.
Mark Shaw: Yeah, the world thinks that they’re kinder than God and that they can do better than God. So, they reject biblical words like drunkard, for example, and they want to say: “Well, you’re an alcoholic, you have this disease, you have this disorder, it’s not your fault.” Now they do say you have to take responsibility for that disease and treat it by going to AA meetings or whatever. And all that’s really behavioral, it’s not biochemical or anything. And so, in the world would you see terms like addict, junkie, and crackhead. And now, even addict is a rejected term. So, it’s an idea that they came up with, but now they can’t solve a problem of stigma. But we can when we use biblical language that says, “hey we’re all sinners. We’re all sinners, and some sin God labels.” And the Bible, you know, it kind of characterizes you like: If you’re a drunkard, you’re characterized by that behavior. But the great news is you see your responsibility in it, your need for Christ and salvation, and then sanctification, and spiritual growth. So, I love how our language, the language of the Bible, is superior. And that’s the battle that I think’s going on in biblical counseling movement right now is: It’s a terminology battle. And those terms are embedded with greater truths. Like when you use addiction, its embedded with the idea of disease and then also embedded into that term, is the idea of being a victim. And if I’m a victim and I didn’t cause this, then something had to cause it. And so, a lot of people are going to trauma and say, “Well it’s trauma, and so people need trauma-informed care,” and all this. And as biblical counselors, we reject those words because of the embedded ideas and theories of man that are false and don’t line up with Scriptural truths.
Dale Johnson: Yeah, that’s exactly right. I mean, this terminology matters. It means something when we use, you know, the idea of trauma-informed or addiction as you described. And we are caught sort of in the middle: We want people to know that we’re describing that there are biblical truths and biblical hope for using such terminology. But before we go on to talking about how the labels that the Scripture gives actually provide proper inditement on some of the problems that we have as people, dealing with legitimate guilt and shame that we experience as human beings. But it also provides hope with that language. That’s a moral disposition. I want to go back, you said something that was very intriguing to me where you described that the secular world created the idea of “the addict”, but now they’re moving away from it. And I think what you’re going to describe—I don’t know this—I’m eager to hear what you’re going to say. But it’s not shocking to me that that’s the case, because secular philosophy always at some point turns in on itself. And it realizes that they can’t provide the answer with that language. Because ultimately what happens is now the person who is an addict, if it is a “disease,” then they’re associated with something that now becomes out of their control and is biological and biochemical and so on. So, I want you to get back to that statement. I was very intrigued by that. What did you mean that they stopped using or they want to stop using this idea of addict? What’s the problem with it and where they trying to move?
Mark Shaw: Now, they think that terms like addict are stigmatizing—which is their term—and they are, and that people are rejecting help because they don’t want to be stigmatized as an addict. So, they see that as a barrier to treatment. I’m talking the addiction world. And so, people aren’t asking for help because nobody wants to be stigmatized as an addict, you know, with this disease. And they’ve created all this thinking they were kinder than God and that they’ve solved it. And it’s really created more problems for them, which is why I love the biblical approach to counseling. We offer true, hope and true freedom in Christ and the new identity in Christ. It’s awesome.
Dale Johnson: Yeah. And I mean, that’s a really key distinction that I think is very helpful: If they were attempting to identify things that people struggle with, on some level distancing the person from any, you know, real legitimate personal responsibility. But yet, still that language becomes stigmatizing. And yet in the Scriptures, you know, the Lord is unafraid to call us by who we really are. In fact, the Scriptures described it. It’s the only thing known to man that can help us to see the type of people we really are, and it will call us out for the ways in which we’re not living in the way God made us—which is to honor and glorify Him. And when we choose other pleasures, like what happens in terms of addiction, the Lord—He calls us out on how we’ve walked away from Him and what to call these issues of sin and the difficulty that comes along with the consequences of choosing this way. And so, we definitely prefer biblical language, not just because it better describes what’s happening, but also, Mark, because it actually leaves the door open for redemption and hope that’s radically different than recovery or an identity being rooted in something that’s biochemical in my body. I want you to talk a little bit about biblical language and how biblical language actually conveys something about God that doesn’t leave us in a hopeless state, like the secular labels do. It actually conveys something radically different in terms of hope
Mark Shaw: Language is so important because it communicates the love of God. I mean God invented language. It belongs to Him. And so, as biblical counselors, we want to convey a love of God to the people we serve. And it’s much more loving, like you just pointed out, to say, “Hey, you have an idolatry problem.” People think idolatry is a harsh word; Idolatry is a great word because it tells people that, “Hey, there’s only one true God. And He is the only one who can save you and can transform you and give you hope to be different.” And so that’s really the love of God. To me, that’s why language is so important. I want to be an agent of love to the people that I serve, and I do that best with biblical language, not secular terms and secular ideas. Biblical language conveys the heart of God and His character, that God is love.
Dale Johnson: I love the way that you’re helping us to see that. And one final thought—we were talking today about a new booklet that you have released. And I’m really excited about Destigmatizing Addiction: Hope Through the Gospel. Give us a sense, Mark, on two things. The first thing is: Why was it important to write such a little booklet to help our readers? And then the second is: What are the primary things that you hope that they take away from this booklet?
Mark Shaw: You know, I write a story that kind of continues on throughout the booklet. And I love that story because it’s not real, but it’s based on real conversations and interactions I’ve had about how there is a difference in the two approaches of a secular approach and a biblical approach. And in the booklet, this young lady is trying to convince her pastor, “We’ve got to bring this stuff into the church. We’ve got to start helping addicts, we’re not doing that.” And he, you know, in the story, flips it and helps her to see that there really is clarity—that these are two different approaches, and they’re not compatible. And so, with the booklet that’s one thing I want to bring us some clarity to. But then the second thing is, again, the hope and the love that’s offered in Jesus Christ in biblical truth. And so, I have even an appendix at the end that talks about the hopeless disease addiction language, and biblical truth and love presented, just to give people the difference. And there are two separate languages that I’m concerned about the biblical counseling movement blending is attempting to blend those two things together, and making it confusing and unclear. So that’s really the big purpose of the booklet
Dale Johnson: Okay, listen brother, I love it. And I think this has been a helpful resource that you’re contributing here. I so appreciate how you think in terms of this whole secular realm of addiction and how you’re bringing biblical truth to bear—not just simply as a force of remedy, but also in how we label these things that help us to see the beauty of the treasures of wisdom and knowledge found in Christ—that we can run to hope. And that people can, not just have this as an Identity for the rest of their life, but they can actually be redeemed, changed and live a life that’s full of peace and hope, longing for what’s to come—where we will be eradicated from sin once and forever. And I appreciate your work here. I want to recommend this booklet that you’ve labored over Mark and thanks for your time today. Appreciate it brother.
Mark Shaw: Thank you, Dale.
