Pastors

I received a call from my pastor, requesting my help. He had spotted a young girl on a curb near the local high school. She was in tears and smelled more like a skid row bum than a 16-year-old from his church. He took her to his office, but he didn't know what to do next. He would have called her parents, but she begged him not to. I hurried over.

When I arrived I found an alert, petite girl, weighing approximately one hundred pounds. I asked her what had happened. She and two other friends had started drinking that morning around 8. She had consumed a pint of whiskey and half a bottle of vodka flavored with peppermint-all of this within four hours. For a girl of her size to consume that much alcohol in that short of time and continue to be alert meant only one thing: she was a full-blown adolescent alcoholic.

As I've worked with chemically addicted youth, I've discovered this is not an unusual scenario. When a drug or alcohol problem arises, people turn to a pastor more frequently than ...

You have reached the end of this Article Preview

To continue reading, subscribe to Christianity Today magazine. Subscribers have full digital access to CT Pastors articles.

Log InSubscribe

Already a CT subscriber? Log in for full digital access.