The first step to successful recovery is returning to our covering! Recovery must begin with a re-covering of God in our lives as our redeemer! Until we surrender and allow Him to fight our battles, we will remain defeated, broken, and wanting.  The psalmist David said it best. 

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.

Psalm 23:1 NIV

There is a void in humanity, a place inside us that can only be filled and satisfied by reconnecting with our Heavenly Father. In Him, we lack nothing! We can try and fill it with money, fame, drugs, relationships, you name it, but only one thing can truly satisfy our existence, and that is being filled and reconnected with God our Father.  

There is a story of a woman in the New Testament who met Jesus at a well.  She had a physical thirst that she was trying to quench, but Jesus pointed out to her a spiritual thirst she was trying to fill. There was an emptiness inside her that left her continually thirsty.  

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans. ) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our Father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?” Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.” He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.” “I have no husband,” she replied. Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.” “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.” 21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is Spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

John 4:7-26 NIV

I believe Jesus was pointing out to her the reason for her many husbands was because something was missing on the inside that kept her looking and thinking that maybe happiness would be found in the right relationship.  She had a void on the inside of her that was not being satisfied.  I would imagine that she thought numerous times – “Maybe the next relationship will help me find what I’m looking for, and I will be satisfied in life.”  Have you ever been there? Maybe it was something else? I’ve been there.  I have lived a life of discontentment always trying something new or chasing after things I thought would give me meaning or make me happy only to find myself still lacking.   

You see, we all do it in one form or another, but the fulfillment and fullness of life come only through being born-again. Jesus said that we will worship in Spirit and truth and the Father looks for that. We are Spirit first and must reconnect to the Father by the Spirit.    Once we truly discover that He is the answer to everything we have been looking for in life, we can finally be content and face the darkness without running to another comfort, which is only a counterfeit and a temporary fix that leaves us empty and unfulfilled.   

The psalmist David continued in Psalm 23 with this. 

He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Psalm 23:2-4 NIV

Whatever we face, there is no lack, and we can find comfort.  In our darkest hour, God is with us. He satisfies and covers us, and when darkness pulls at us and tries to regain ground, His rod and shepherding staff will guide us safely through this life.  He will refresh our soul and satisfy the longing that is on the inside of us, and that reconnect will comfort and assure us as we travel through this life.

 Our covering is God, and He has provided everything we will ever need!