Boastfully Broken: A Christian Drug Addict’s Fight for Freedom

By Blake Rispens

Daily, we experience the reality we aren’t who we portray ourselves to be. We live in the brokenness of a fallen world with the affects taking root in the deepest parts of who we are. Rather than hide and mask the many weaknesses and frailties we experience as humans, there is another way.

In Boastfully Broken, author Blake Rispens highlights how a Christian who struggles with substance abuse began discovering what would really bring hope to a hopeless situation. While hiding weaknesses brings temporary relief, it only leads to continual failures down the road. True grace and power come from a seemingly counterintuitive idea: to be happy and boastful about what makes us weak.

Boastfully Broken challenges your deepest beliefs about who you are and who God says you are, and it discusses how to practically deal with those besetting weaknesses you’d rather not talk about. God’s way of overcoming your most intimate of weaknesses may be a surprise to you. And it’s in that space where you finally find what you’ve been looking for: a power and grace that specifically deals with your deepest brokenness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Feb 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9781664259096

Blake Rispens

Blake Rispens earned a bachelor’s degree in pastoral studies from the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago and has more than eighteen years of experience in addiction and recovery. He uses his experience of repeated failures, even as a Christian, as the catalyst for finding true freedom and grace from weakness and brokenness.

Book preview

Copyright © 2022 Blake Rispens.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

WestBow Press

A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.westbowpress.com

844-714-3454

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-6642-5910-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-5911-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6642-5909-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022903482

WestBow Press rev. date: 02/25/2022

CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter 1 Religious Resumes

Chapter 2 I am Who I’m Not

Chapter 3 Weaknesses are the Whys

Chapter 4 The Godly Braggart

Chapter 5 All the More Gladly

Chapter 6 Big Heads, Little Hearts; Little Heads, Big Hearts

Chapter 7 The Sympathizer

Chapter 8 Our Focus

Conclusion

PREFACE

But he said to me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

—2 Corinthians 12:9 ESV

By the time you’re finished reading this book, my hope is that you find what I found as life giving, a different way to deal with the weakness, insufficiency, and brokenness we know so well as humans in a fallen world. This book is written with one intent: to convince you that biblical Christianity should exhibit a glad willingness to be frank and honest about our weaknesses to the point that we would even dare to brag or boast about what makes us weak. This comes with some major challenges. First, we need to specifically know what makes us weak and ultimately unable to achieve what God really demands of us, which may be an obstacle for some. Second, we need to truly be joyful that we are weak. What I mean is that we need to be happy about what makes us need God. (Which is an obstacle for us all.) What a seemingly counterintuitive idea, if you ask me.

What makes this such a challenge for us is living in a western culture where self-effort, self-preservation, self-will, self-determination, and positive self-image are celebrated and glorified above everything else. We want people to see us as successful, important, intelligent, put together, doing life the right way, doing Christianity the right way, and, most importantly, wanting people to value us according to our gifts, talents, and successes. But there’s a problem: When we bring the importance of self-worth and self-effort to the table of Christianity, we lose Christianity all together. We lose God’s grace and God’s power. And both grace and power are needed for Christianity to be lived out and ultimately experienced as a reality.

I’ve been a Christian now for about fifteen years. I was saved when I was twenty-two, although I did grow up in a Christian home. The past fifteen years have had some good times here and there but honestly, a lot more bad times. After crashing and burning over and over again, I wanted to know why. It didn’t make any sense to me. What was I doing wrong? Why was I falling into the same hole over and over again? Was I not truly saved? Did I not love Jesus enough? Was I not trying hard enough? Why did it seem like everyone else around me was doing great as a Christian but I was still struggling? What I realized was that I was missing an important element of the Christian faith. A very necessary element.

It wasn’t until I read 2 Corinthians 12:9 that the lightbulb came on. I needed to get honest with myself. I soon discovered that I was avoiding, and even more, blatantly avoiding one of the most important aspects of Christianity, which is to be joyful and boastful about why I needed God’s grace and power in my life. We can easily admit we’re sinners, but to admit that we’re weak is a big stretch to our westernized minds. "No way! I’m not weak, look how much I’ve accomplished, look at how strong I am. I’m educated, I have a great job, I exercise, I’ve got gifts, and talents. I can pull myself up by my bootstraps.