When the Phone Rings

It was Friday evening and the phone rang,

my beloved answered it thinking it was my daughter that lives in Plymouth, he answered it with a light sound in his voice, but in just a moment the sound of his voice changed as he handed me the phone and said “its him”.
In an instant a heavy weight was lifted off my shoulders. That’s the only way I can explain it. That moment that comes when your greatest fear has been put to rest and you can breathe easy…

“I just called to tell you I’m back in a rehab”

"Where?"

"I’m in High Point, just got here today"

"good…"

That’s all I could handle at that point. I breathed a huge sigh of relief knowing he was alive and in recovery. I didn’t want to know anymore… not yet. Part of me wanted to ask “WHY”… but the other part of me wasn’t ready to hear it or for that matter to continue talking to him, I was still angry.
“I’ll call you tomorrow”

“you don’t have to call me every day, you can call me when you’re going to make the next step, just work on you"

I slept easy that night for the first time in days.

It would be three more days till I heard from him again. By then I had the guts to ask…

“What happened”?


"I just lost control, I couldn’t take it anymore. The need for drugs was bigger than my need to be at home. I knew…right after I did it I would never be able to go home again. That’s why I couldn’t pick up the phone when you called. I couldn’t talk to anyone. I felt so bad".

He spent the last two weeks on a drug binge that would come crashing down around him, the thought of withdrawal without the help of a rehab was so scary he brought himself to the hospital. This was the first time he would do this all on his own. Each time in the past I would get the call to bring him. This time he manned up and got himself there.

For the first time in years I’m sensing an ownership of all this in my son that has never been there before.

God I know you have given me the strength in this past hardship to completely let go of him. I know he is firmly in your hand.

John 10:28b ~...no one can snatch them out of My hand.