Chris Epson grew up in California, served a mission in Chile. He and his wife, Marilyn, moved to Utah in 1980, and currently live in South Jordan. Hey have two grown children, both active in the Church, and six grandchildren. He and his wife currently serve as missionaries in the Addiction Recovery program, and help lead a 12 Step meeting for couples on Thursdays in Sandy. He also serves in the stake Sunday School presidency. He was first exposed to pornography at eleven and finally at the age of sixty-two hit rock bottom where God gave him the opportunity to heal and begin recovery at Desert Solace in St. George. He and his wife have experienced grace and miracles in all areas of their life in the past nine and a half years, and are passionate about addiction and recovery.
Enter Chris…
In the wise words of Richard Rohr,
“Nothing just goes away in the spiritual world; all must be reconciled and accounted for.”
Elder Packer encourages us that:
“The atonement can wash clean every stain no matter how difficult or how long or how many times repeated…”
“The atonement leaves no tracks, no traces. What it fixes is fixed…. It just heals, and what it heals stays healed.”
There are also a couple of scriptures that I have come to love in recovery, which didn’t mean much to me before. One is in the first chapter of Isaiah, verses 18 and 19:
“Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”
And verse 19 is the follow up to this incredible promise:
“If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat of the good of the land.”
A Radical Change
Needless to say, we could talk about the details of this for hours, but let’s not. Instead, I think it’s so cool that God starts out by saying, “Let’s talk about this,” as if this concept of complete and utter forgiveness of sin is perfectly logical. And then He uses not one, but two very visual examples of what this looks like—scarlet and crimson, which are really dark, deep reds, and He’s going to turn that into white—white like snow or wool. He’s pretty clear here. This is radical change.
And then another promise. If (and it’s a BIG IF) I am willing and obedient; I get the good stuff:
- Abundance.
- Life.
- Joy.
- And that list goes on.
Now I know that I’m not perfectly willing all the time, and certainly not perfectly obedient, but as I make the daily attempt at it, I get to live with that clean snow and white wool.
The second is in modern scripture, section 58 of the Doctrine and Covenants, verses 42 and 43:
“Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more. By this ye may know if a man repenteth of his sins – behold, he will confess them and forsake them.”
Wow!
What sins?
I may remember them, but God won’t. Complete forgiveness. 100% gone.
We talk a lot about repentance in our churches, but these promises only become real when we experience them.
And I have.
It Became Real
Maybe a month or so after arriving at Desert Solace, an addiction recovery facility, we were in a yoga session with our instructor Miriam. At the beginning of every session, she would have some cards with messages on them—positive aspirations—and we would randomly pick one. Then we were asked to focus on that message during yoga.
This time I picked a card that talked about forgiveness, but specifically about forgiving yourself. I had been giving this a lot of thought early in rehab and recovery, and the message really resonated with me that day. I kept that message in mind as I struggled with yoga poses (I wasn’t good at yoga, but I came to love it). Then, towards the end of the hour, as we were lying still in Savasana, very relaxed and quiet, with soft music playing and Miriam talking softly, I became very focused on my forgiveness.
As I did this, it was as if warm water was flowing over me. I had never felt anything like that before in my life. It was like pure love, and it was real. There were tears running down my cheeks, and I knew I was going to be ok—this was forgiveness! And it felt so good.
Then it was time to sit back up in the lotus pose, and I was disappointed that the feeling had gone. But as I once again closed my eyes and focused, it came back. It was so warm and comforting, and I cried again. It was in that moment those scriptures, and those promises, became real to me.
Negative Rabbit Holes
A couple of weeks later, while we were all sitting around the dining room table studying one afternoon, one of the guys was frustrated because the workbook asked him to recount, and list, the porn websites he had visited in his addiction.
A conversation started about these websites, and I of course added to it, in fact, I kind of led the way, almost bragging about the crappy places I had spent time in on the internet.
Not long after, it was time for us to go to the gym, which we did almost every day. We loved to play racquetball at the gym, and when we started to play, I was horrible. No energy. No focus. It was like I had never played before.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that the conversation I had led earlier had stolen my energy. I could feel it. I had revisited my rabbit hole, and just talking about it had shifted my energy back to pre-recovery days.
It was such a weird but vivid experience.
Godly Sorrow
When we got back to the house and were getting ready to go out to the stables, I apologized to the guys for leading that discussion and asked for their forgiveness. Of course, they said it was no big deal, but it was for me.
For some reason it nagged at me, and that night as I was reading in chapter 39 of Alma, I read his words to his son, Corianton: verse 7:
“And now, my son, I would to God that ye had not been guilty of so great a crime. I would not dwell upon your crimes, to harrow up your soul, if it were not for your own good.”
Even though I had experienced forgiveness, and had forgiven myself, I had now been reminded of my “crimes,” my screwed-up darkness I had lived in for so long.
Thus, my soul was “harrowed up”, and it came flooding back.
When I got down on my knees that night to pray, all I could do was cry, sobbing, and I couldn’t say much of anything. I just knelt there crying for fifteen or twenty minutes but not feeling guilt for anything—that really was gone—but just feeling very, very sad. And I was especially sad for how I had hurt my wife, my children, and others.
I literally cried myself to sleep that night, and the next morning in check-in I again apologized to the guys. Later that morning we had a session with Lynne, and I asked to speak to her in private. I told her what I had experienced, and she just smiled at me. I thought, “Why is she so happy about this?” Then she said two words:
“Godly sorrow.”
That’s what I was feeling, and it was a good thing. A necessary thing.
In chapter seven of 2 Corinthians, Paul talks about godly sorrow leading to repentance, and then says in verse 10:
“For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.”
This experience with “godly sorrow” was another turning point in my recovery journey.
The Truth Will Set You Free
After getting home from Desert Solace, I met with my bishop at church. My intention? To confess, to spill my guts about all the horrible details of my addictive life for so many years.
As an addict, I was the guy that would never, ever tell another soul about what I had done, and was doing, especially my church leaders. No way! It was all going to the grave with me, and I just assumed I was on my way to hell anyway.
However, very soon in recovery, through working Step One, I knew not only that I would confess to him, but I was looking forward to it!
I had discovered that the truth really would set me free. Of course, the bishop already knew most of this, because he had been meeting with my wife at least weekly while I was at Desert Solace.
He listened intently as I shared my past, and then, when I was done, he smiled and told me simply how much he loved me, and we needed to play golf together.
Pure love and understanding.
A True Relief
The next week my wife and I met separately with our stake president, and I recounted all of the same stuff to him. He was pretty serious, but also listened very intently, and asked me for more details. We both met with him a few more times and knew that there would be a disciplinary council to discuss my standing as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
I knew early in recovery that I would probably lose my church membership, be excommunicated as a result of the things I had done. But although I knew that, when my stake president gave us a date for that council, and told each of us that I would probably be excommunicated, we both went home and cried together.
It’s amazing how I treated that church membership so lightly for so many years of my life, but now, as I was about to lose it, it meant so much to me.
Early on a Sunday morning, we met with the high council, and the stake presidency. My wife and bishop were invited to be with me. As we walked into that room, the brethren were singing a hymn, and I felt this incredibly strong spirit of pure love, unlike anything I’d ever felt at church before.
The True Power of Shepherding Love
The stake president told them why we were there and then allowed me to tell my story. I did, for about forty-five minutes. When I was finished, I was asked to answer a couple of questions, and then we were asked to wait outside while they deliberate.
Here’s what’s amazing: I felt great! I didn’t expect that. We thought maybe this would be so depressing and difficult, we’d just want to go home and go back to bed for the rest of the day. But that’s not what happened. I felt light and happy. I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face, and I shared that feeling with the bishop and with my wife.
We were invited back in a few minutes later, and I was told that I was no longer a member of the Church. Each of those brethren, most of whom I did not know at all, told me how much they loved me. I was able to go around the room and hug each one of them.
Once again, just pure love. I know this sounds crazy, and it is certainly not the experience of others, but for me this was one of the great spiritual experiences of my entire life. I knew that the Lord had boundaries, as did the Church, and I had violated those boundaries in a big way, repeatedly.
Starting Over
I knew that I was not being punished, I was being given the opportunity to “confess and forsake” my sins, to start over and really complete the process of repentance.
As an excommunicated member, I was invited and encouraged to attend church each Sunday. I could not give a talk or prayer in church or partake of the sacramental bread and water.
I was not really supposed to comment in classes unless called upon, but that part didn’t work out so well, I had a hard time keeping my mouth shut. And still do.
I have discovered a depth to the gospel of Jesus Christ that I never knew was there before, and I’m still discovering more because it never ends. And it’s fun!
The good…no, great news, about fourteen months later: I was baptized a member of the Church.
I invited about fifty people to be there, including folks from Desert Solace, along with many other people who had both forgiven me and supported us, and it was totally awesome.
Great News
Talking about repentance, Dale G. Renlund said:
“Without the Redeemer, the inherent hope and joy evaporate, and repentance becomes simply miserable behavior modification.”
“We do not pull ourselves up; we are pulled…God uses our own sins in our favor! God brings us—through failure—from unconsciousness to ever-deeper consciousness and conscience. How could that not be good news for just about everybody?”
Not just good news, but great news!
I know.
