Confessions of a Christian Alcoholic with Jon Seidl

“When I numbed anxiety and uncertainty, I also numbed beauty and joy.”

That moment of clarity from Ericka Graham came after years of abusing prescription drugs, when God met her in a beautiful way involving a bumble bee and a flower. The point? Substances numb the bad, sure, but they also numb the good.

But addiction...

“If you think you have an issue, you probably do.”

That sentence from Carol McCracken gets to the heart of this week's episode. Carol didn’t fit the picture she had in her mind of what an alcoholic looked like. She was a Christian. A Bible study teacher. A ministry leader. A good mom. And for years, she told herself the same thing many of us do:...

“We can think and act our way to a new feeling. We cannot feel our way to a new way of thinking and acting.”

That line from therapist and author Nicole Zasowski cuts to the heart of anxiety, addiction, and the stories we tell ourselves when life feels uncertain. Nicole is the author of

“I don’t want to be 60 years old having the same issues I had when I was 25.”

What an honest and important statement from this week's guest, Brandon Ricks. Because the truth is, too many of us have just resigned ourselves to always being the way we are now. The fight for something different is hard, and so...

“Trauma does not reside in the bad event. Trauma is what becomes embedded in your body in the wake of a bad event when there’s no one there to comfort you.”

What if you've been viewing trauma all wrong? And what if you don't think you've experienced trauma but you actually have? My guest this week is renowned trauma therapist Adam Young, and we...

“We all just have different medicines that we reach for.”

That’s how Tim Sexton describes the real story behind the affair that blew up his life. Even though at one point that affair led to his downfall as a pastor, today it's not something he hides from. Instead, he's leaning into it in hopes to help oth...

“Our hypocrisy is our testimony. That’s God’s glory on display.”

That truth from Faith Womack is exactly what those of us with messy sanctification stories not only need to hear, but embrace and embody. We all fall short. We all stumble. And yet, God uses our weakness—not our polished moments—to reveal His power and his grace.

“I was tormented. Literally tormented. I'd look in the mirror and go, ‘What are you doing? That’s not you.’”

Brandon Puffer had everything, or so it seemed. He was a Major League pitcher with a World Series ring and was even being groomed to be a big league coach. But beneath the success were so many secret wounds that he refused to ...

“Sin’s power is disconnection.”

That's one of the essential ideas that runs through what therapist and author Chuck DeGroat talks about in this episode. A longtime pastor and counselor, Chuck isn't just commenting on burnout and addiction from afar—he's actually lived it. In fact, he opens up about h...

“Sin doesn’t care who you are or what you’ve seen—it’s coming for all of us.”

That theme runs through Kirby Kelly’s story. See, she's part of a group of women you don't often hear about: females that struggle (or have struggled) with pornography addiction. Kirby's story is heartbr...

“Getting sober without salvation is like giving a painkiller to a cancer patient.”

That’s how John Elmore describes the difference between behavior modification and true transformation. He'd know. He was on the verge of ending it all with a shotgun when he finally realized his problem went deeper than just the alcohol. In this powerful and deepl...

“I didn’t know how to sit still with myself. I didn’t want to be alone with myself.”

That’s what Hannah Brencher realized when she was finally able to admit she was an addict. But she wasn't addicted to any substance. Instead, she suffered from an addiction much more common, much more acceptable: her phone. And so many of us share th...

“Once I started drinking, I didn’t want to stop until something made me.”

That’s how Stephanie Ziebell describes the grip alcohol had on her life. Stephanie got sober in Wisconsin—the capital of drinking culture. The place where not having alcohol at your wedding is like not having a bride. But as she shares, even in the middle of a state built on beer, Jesus met her in the mess and gave her freedom sh...

“Shame is first and foremost not a thing that begins with me thinking a certain thing about myself. It begins first as a thing that I feel literally in my body.”

That’s how Dr. Curt Thompson reframed shame in our incredible conversation—and I think he'll probably do the same for you, too. Curt is a psychiatrist, author, and speaker who ha...

“High performers can hold it together—but that doesn’t mean it’s healthy.”

That’s how Julie Holly describes the tension she lived in for years. On the outside, she was a successful entrepreneur, coach, and podcaster. But on the inside, alcohol was becoming her go-to solution for stress, escape, and the ache of not belonging. And like many high-performers, her success masked the weight that alcoho...

“If I’m numbing the lows, I’m numbing the highs. And then I’m just in this nothingness.”

Here's the thing about alcohol: So many of us use it to numb the lows, but alcohol isn't a precision numbing agent. What does that mean? That while it can be useful to deal with the valleys, it also keeps you from enjoying the peaks.

“Forgiveness is not the goal of salvation. Fellowship with God is the goal of salvation.”

Think about that for a second. I had to. That’s how Kyle Worley reframes the Gospel in his new book, Home with God. And at first glance, it may seem...odd. Because so many of us think salvation is mainly about getting our sins forgiven so we can go to heave...

“There’s a part of you that drinks and a part of you that doesn’t—and that doesn’t make you crazy. That makes you human.”

What happens when your faith says one thing and your actions say another? And what do you do when the coping mechanisms that once helped you survive start controlling you? That’s where today’s co...

“There are really only two kinds of people in this world—people in recovery who know they are, and people in recovery who think they're not.”

Tullian Tchividjian was on top of the Christian world. A bestselling author, megachurch pastor, sought-after speaker—and yes, the grandson of Billy Graham. Then everything imploded.