Are You Captive? Personal Essay Example

Exodus 3:7-10 7 Then the Lord told him, I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their cries of distress because of their harsh slave drivers. Yes, I am aware of their suffering. 8 So I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and lead them out of Egypt into their own fertile and spacious land. It is a land flowing with milk and honeythe land where the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites now live. 9 Look! The cry of the people of Israel has reached me, and I have seen how harshly the Egyptians abuse them. 10 Now go, for I am sending you to Pharaoh. You must lead my people Israel out of Egypt.

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I am a recovering alcoholic. It is five years since I last drank alcohol. I had a troubled childhood. My father was physically abusive to my mother and I. He always came home, late into the night drunk. Whenever my mother asked him why he always came back home drunk and late into the night, my father would turn violent. Given that he always came back home four to five hours after we had taken our supper, he always found his supper on the dining table, covered but cold. He would later spend close to thirty minutes protesting why he was being offered cold food, oblivious to the fact that he was the one who had come back home late. When I grew old, I realized that my fathers behavior was out of his frustrations in life. He was once a reputable lawyer in my hometown, but he was deregistered after being found guilty of misappropriating clients funds. As a result, he decided to drown his sorrows in alcohol. As a child, I was always ridiculed by my school mates for having a drunkard father. My teenage years were not rosy either. As a teenager, I grappled with issues of identity. I had no one who could teach me about being a man. I always felt envious when I heard stories from my peers about their fathers taking them to fishing, hunting, and sports events. As a result, I developed low self-esteem, I started to view myself as not worthy of affection and love. I became more self-conscious about my identity, problems, and issues that I was contending with. As I became more self-conscious, my academic performance plummeted. I had very few friends; many of my peers did not want to associate with me because they viewed me as a loser. I performed dismally in my final year exams of my elementary school. My mother could not afford to take me to secondary school, and that became the end of my academic life. I started doing odd jobs in my hometown like lawn mowing rich peoples compounds and pruning their fences. I used to save some money, and after one year I had saved some money that I used to travel to Cleveland. I had heard stories that in Cleveland, there were well paying odd jobs that could be done by a person with an elementary education. I was lucky to find work on a dairy farm, but since I had not attained legal age to work, I worked clandestinely. Most of my colleagues at the farm were illegal immigrants from Mexico, some of who were forty years older than me.

As workers of the dairy farm, we lived in a nondescript house on the southern side of the farm. In the house, that is where I saw marijuana and methamphetamine for the first time. After work, my colleagues would smoke marijuana and methamphetamine. Because they viewed me as a kid who could not stand the effects of marijuana and methamphetamine, they often offered me alcoholic drinks. They told me that they had friends who used to smuggle marijuana and methamphetamine from Mexico. In the beginning, I was hesitant about accepting their offer, but with time, I said to myself, Where is the harm in giving it a try? Never did I know that that was my first step in the journey of alcoholism! As days passed, work at the farm continued to be harder and tougher. Given that I had discovered the healing effects of alcohol, I continued drowning my stress in alcohol. At first, I used to drink twice a week; it reached a point where I started to drink on a daily basis. As I started to drink on a daily basis, my work performance deteriorated. I spent most morning hours nursing a hangover. As a result, I could not perform my tasks effectively. My supervisor noticed a decline in my performance, summoned me and told me that it was high time I pull up my socks, or I would lose my job. At that point, I did not know that I had already become addicted to alcohol. I tried my best to avoid alcohol but I could not. Due to my underperformance at the farm, I was fired. I found myself in the streets of Cleveland, homeless and with no money. In the streets, I became a beggar. I started to beg for money from pedestrians. I could not do without alcohol; I became a slave of alcohol. I hardly ate, and I spent all the money I got from borrowing in drinking alcohol. As a result of being alcoholic and hardly eating, I became frail. I became emaciated to the extent that there is a point I accidentally saw myself in a mirror and could not recognize myself.

A turning point in my life came when I found myself in a hospital. When I asked how I found myself in the hospital, I was told that a Good Samaritan had found me in the middle of a busy street, unconscious. I was told that I was very lucky to be alive and that there were high chances I could have been hit by a speeding car. Doctors at the hospital were shocked to discover that I had such a high level of alcohol in my blood. The doctors confirmed that I was alcoholic and needed to be taken to a rehabilitation center. While in the rehabilitation center, there were members of a church near the rehabilitation center who used to pay us a visit and preach to us. The members of the church used to give us brochures and pamphlets that spoke about Gods undying and unconditional love for us, as human beings. While in the hospital, I started to think about my life. I started to ask myself what life was all about and what was its meaning. One of the most memorable stories that captured my attention was the story of Moses and the burning bush. In the story of the burning bush, God summons Moses and tells him that he has seen the suffering of His people in captivity, in Egypt. God further tells Moses that due to His love for the Israelites, He has decided to set them free from bondage. After reading the story of Moses and the burning bush, that is when it hit me, that there was someone who loves me so much to the extent that He could set me free from shackles of alcoholism. I decided to give my life to Jesus Christ, I became saved, and from that day henceforth, I have never looked back. I am now free from shackles of alcoholism, and I give all praise to Jesus.

I would invite your attention to the story of the burning bush that best illustrates how God can save us from enslavement. I think we are all familiar with the story of Moses and the Burning bush in Exodus chapter 3. In the story, Moses was tending to his father-in-law's flock and came to Mount Sinai. At Mount Sinai, the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses in flames of fire. Moses was surprised to see that fire in a bush, but the bush was not being consumed. As Moses approached the burning bush, God told Moses not to move any further but to take off his sandals since he was standing on holy ground. God then introduces Himself as God, the father of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God goes further to tell Moses that He has seen the suffering of His people in Egypt, he has heard their cry and that He is determined to rescue them from yokes of slavery in Egypt. The Lord says that after taking Israelites from Egypt, He will take them to a land flowing with honey and milk. God says that He know Egyptians will be reluctant to free Israelites but He will use all means including striking Egyptians will all wonders so that they may set the Israelites free.

The story of Moses and the burning bush reveals that God can set us free from any enslavement. What we need to do us Christians is to trust in God, and He will deliver us from all types of enslavement. Most people are slaves, yet they do not know. Most people are slaves of drugs, pleasing people, alcohol, money, and fame. The Bible says worldly things cannot give us satisfaction. The things that have enslaved us are akin to Pharaoh. It is only God who can set us free. Therefore, we should turn our eyes to the GREAT I AM, and He will set us free from captivity. There are many people in the world who do not know how they can be set free from captivity. As a result, many people continue to be engrossed in their enslavement.

The story of Moses and the burning bush reveals that once God frees us from enslavement, He would go ahead, reform us and make our lives better. God sees our suffering, and He is willing to help us if we acknowledge Him and turn to Him. By God saying that He will use all means to set the Israelites free, He means that He is willing to do all that He can to set us free from any enslavement as long as we turn to Him. Suffice is to say that God is our chain breaker!

Bibliography

Dake, Finis. 2013. Dake's annotated reference Bible: the Holy Bible, containing the Old and New Testaments of the New King James version. Lawrenceville, Georgia: Dake Publishing, Inc.

Dana, H. E., and Julius R. Mantey. 1993. A manual grammar of the Greek New Testament. New York: Macmillan.

Freeman, James M. 1972. Manners and customs of the Bible. Plainfield, New Jersey: Logos.

Simon, Mary Manz. 1998. Moses and the burning bush: a story of faith and obeying God. Nashville: Tommy Nelson.

Massey, Gerald. 2011. Ancient Egypt the light of the world: a work of reclamation and restitution in twelve books. Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. New York: Zuubooks.