Is Love Enough?

I just finished a month long study of "The Five Love Languages" by Dr. Gary Chapman. One cannot spend that much time discussing love without naturally contemplating the role love plays in our own life. I spent hours wondering if love is enough when we are dealing with an addict. Whether the addict is our spouse or children, friend or other family member. I wondered, how do we express our love to the addict, what love language do we speak?
Was my love communicated when I sat for hours in the emergency rooms after she had swallowed too many pills. Was love realized in the beginning when the time was spent in hospital waiting rooms as she tried to obtain a prescription; cleverly feigning ailments that did not exist. Did my words of encouragement reflect a loving attitude? Is sympathy or empathy a language of love. There were hugs then arguments, was this done with love? When I cradled her head through the sickness of withdrawals, when I wiped her brows of sweat when her body rejected the absence of drugs, did she know it was because of love? Could fifteen years of abuse been avoided if I had loved her enough in the beginning? Would my love be enough to keep her from going back to the pill?

Addiction is stronger than love.

God is stronger than addiction.

In all the ways we will show our love to someone who has succumbed to the ravages of addiction, if we fail to pray, if we fail to have faith and if we fail to tell them about God, our ways will be a waste.
The Bible tells us in 1st John chapter 4, verse 10;
"This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins."
Does she know that God loves her. Does she know that God can help? Did I tell her? John went on to write in the very next verse
"Dear friends, since God loved us, we also ought to love one another."
Is love enough? Not yours, not mine. Only God's.
If you face this situation today, tell the one you love about the One that loves them. Tell them that you love them, and then tell them again that God loves them. Keep telling them until they believe, until they stop.
Have faith my friend, God loves you too.