Tomorrow

One of the bars I frequented in college had an old neon sign hanging on the wall:

FREE BEER TOMORROW

It was the perfect bar sign because the offer could never be collected. Tomorrow was always one day away.

At 12:01 in the morning, usually drunk and convinced I was hilarious, I would make the same joke: “It is tomorrow now. Bring on the free beer.”

By that point in the night, I had often tipped the bartenders enough that they would give in and show me some reciprocated love. The beer was not actually free. I had already paid for it several times over through the drinks, tips, time, and condition I was in when I asked.

I did not know then how much that sign would eventually mean.

Years later, after college, marriage, children, businesses, wins, losses, and more alcohol-driven stories than I can comfortably count, God used the same words to teach me something the bar never intended.

Free beer tomorrow.

Not today.

Tomorrow.

And when tomorrow arrived, the answer remained the same.

I kept asking God to help me quit forever. He taught me to obey Him today.

The Longest Sober Stretch

The longest uninterrupted stretch of sobriety I have experienced was from 1988, when I was born, until around 2002.

That is a difficult sentence to write.

From approximately 2002 through 2026, I honestly believe there may have been more days when I drank than days when I was completely sober. I cannot prove that calculation from a calendar, and not every season looked the same. But there were periods when I drank every day for months—possibly even close to a year.

It is a wonder something even worse did not happen.

By high school, alcohol was there. It gave us something to do. It made ordinary nights feel like events. It became a bandage when something hurt, a pick-me-up when I was down, a celebration when life was good, and an activity when nothing else seemed exciting enough.

Alcohol could fit almost any emotion.

If I was happy, we could celebrate.

If I was hurt, I could numb it.

If I was bored, we could make something happen.

If I was nervous, it could loosen me up.

If I was successful, I had earned it.

If I failed, I deserved relief.

It did not have to create the occasion because I could give it a role in every occasion.

For a long time, I believed I was consuming alcohol.

Looking back, it consumed me more than I consumed it.

Functional Was My Favorite Defense

What began changing my thinking was not one dramatic arrest, wreck, diagnosis, or intervention. It was noticing how much I could consume while still appearing functional.

How many drinks could I have without getting caught?

How intoxicated could I become without looking out of control?

How much could I mix with other substances while still showing up, talking, traveling, working, and convincing myself I was fine?

The tolerance became scary.

There were times when I drank and used drugs heavily but believed I did not experience a normal hangover because I never fully came back down before starting again. I could consume more than people I considered to have serious problems. When they could no longer keep up with me, the competitive part of my mind felt a small amount of pride.

That is how distorted the scoreboard had become.

I saw their inability to continue as evidence of their problem.

I saw my ability to continue as evidence of my strength.

What I called capacity was becoming captivity.

Tolerance is not a trophy. Needing much more alcohol to get the effect that used to require less is one of the recognized warning signs clinicians consider when evaluating alcohol use disorder. I did not understand it as a warning. I treated it like another competition I was winning.

The winner in me was proud of surviving what should have frightened me.

In my mind, I did not have a problem because I believed I could quit anything cold turkey whenever I wanted. I had learned a few mental tricks early in life that helped me align with goals, shut down a desire, or force myself into action.

I believed the ability to stop someday proved I was free today.

But freedom is not the theoretical power to stop.

Freedom is being able to stop without continually moving the date.

College Took the Long Route

I took the long route through college. I changed majors, degrees, and even schools. I was not especially motivated to leave because I had built a life full of friends who could party as hard as I could. There was always trouble available, and many of the funniest stories seemed to begin after our blood-alcohol levels were already far beyond where the night should have ended.

I used to joke that my blood-alcohol level zeroed out at .12. In other words, what most people would consider significantly impaired was the point at which I felt normal.

It was a joke.

It was also an admission disguised as one.

The bar with the neon sign became part of that world. I saw FREE BEER TOMORROW as a clever promise I could outsmart at midnight. The sign said tomorrow. I found a loophole at 12:01.

That pattern followed me long after the bar.

I became skilled at turning limits into negotiations.

No more tonight became one last drink.

Not during the week became a special occasion.

Only socially became alone when the day was hard enough.

I will stop when life settles down became another season of using alcohol to survive the life I refused to face clearly.

Every boundary eventually reached its own 12:01.

Stop It

One of my favorite comedy clips is Bob Newhart’s “Stop It” sketch. He plays a therapist whose entire solution to a patient’s fear and anxiety is two blunt words:

Stop it.

The humor works because real pain is rarely that simple. People do not usually escape trauma, anxiety, addiction, depression, or destructive patterns because someone looked at them and supplied the obvious instruction.

Still, something about the simplicity has always connected with me.

Before a person changes, there is often a moment when the internal argument ends. The person stops defending the pattern, stops asking whether it is technically bad enough, stops comparing his behavior with someone worse, and finally says:

I do not want to keep living this way.

For me, that decision mattered.

But “stop it” was the doorway, not the entire recovery plan.

Addiction is not always defeated by personality, competition, mental tricks, or force. For people who have been drinking heavily for a prolonged period, suddenly stopping without medical guidance can be dangerous. Some people need supervised withdrawal care, medication, treatment, recovery support, counseling, financial safeguards, new relationships, and continuing accountability.

What worked as a mental starting point for me should not become shame for someone whose road requires more help.

The point is not that change is easy.

The point is that change cannot begin while I am still protecting the thing I say I want freedom from.

God Said Things Needed to Change

Years after college, marriage, and children, I was lying in bed when I sensed God telling me that things needed to change.

One of those changes was alcohol.

No more.

My immediate response was confidence: Done deal. Simple.

I had spent years believing that I could stop anything whenever I chose. Here was the moment to prove it.

The instruction may have been simple, but the timeline felt impossible. “Never drink again” sounded heavier than I wanted to admit. Forever was too large to carry. Forever included every future celebration, difficult night, business dinner, airport lounge, vacation, loss, victory, wedding, funeral, lonely evening, and moment when I would want something to quiet my mind.

My brain wanted to negotiate an entire lifetime before obeying for one day.

Then the old neon sign returned in a completely different form:

Free beer tomorrow.

If I did not drink today, I could tell myself alcohol would still exist tomorrow. I was not required to win every future craving at the same time. I only had to make the decision in front of me.

Sometimes that meant one day.

Sometimes it meant one hour.

Sometimes it meant the next five minutes while the urge was loud.

I moved the goalpost every day.

At 12:01, unlike the bartender who occasionally rewarded my joke, I did not collect the beer. A new day had arrived, so tomorrow was once again twenty-four hours away.

That may sound like a trick.

For me, it created enough room for obedience.

Forever demanded a promise about every day I had not lived. God asked for the day already in my hands.

Two Different Tomorrows

There are two ways tomorrow appears in this story.

The first is the tomorrow alcohol sold me.

Drink today. Heal tomorrow.

Escape today. Face it tomorrow.

Celebrate today. Repair the damage tomorrow.

Borrow relief from tomorrow and let the future version of you pay the bill.

That tomorrow never arrived because each new day came with another reason to postpone freedom.

The second tomorrow is the one God taught me to approach through today’s obedience.

Do not carry every future battle right now.

Do not require a lifetime guarantee before making the next faithful choice.

Do not worry about tomorrow as though God has already abandoned you there.

Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your heart.

The difference is not whether I think about tomorrow. The difference is what I do today.

Alcohol told me to delay obedience until tomorrow.

God told me that tomorrow would be changed by today’s obedience.

The enemy used tomorrow to postpone freedom. God used today to begin it.

Matthew 6:34 says not to worry about tomorrow because tomorrow will have concerns of its own. Jesus was not teaching laziness or pretending consequences do not exist. He was refusing to let imagined future weight steal the obedience, presence, and grace available now.

Hebrews carries the urgency from the other direction: Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your heart.

Not someday when the craving disappears.

Not after the last celebration.

Not when life becomes less stressful.

Today.

The Year That Proved Today Could Work

That first major season of sobriety lasted almost a year.

It was the first time in decades that I experienced life without alcohol and several other forms of noise and addiction controlling the edges of my days. The changes were not a trophy God handed me for being strong. They were the accumulating fruit of many ordinary decisions.

One airport lounge with nothing.

One business-class flight with nothing.

One lunch at an Irish pub with nothing.

One difficult day without numbing it.

One good day without needing to amplify it.

One evening of feeling what was actually happening instead of prescribing myself an escape.

Danielle noticed almost immediately because the pattern was so unusual. On the first day of travel after the decision, she watched alcohol remain available in every place where I normally would have accepted it. When she asked what was happening, I told her what I believed God had said.

During that nearly sober year, relationships changed. Parts of my life were restored. My thinking became clearer. I discovered that alcohol had not only been affecting nights when I drank heavily. It had been shaping how I celebrated, coped, connected, avoided, recovered, and interpreted my own emotions.

Removing it did not make every painful thing disappear.

It made it harder for me to disappear from the pain.

That is an important distinction. Sobriety did not automatically solve every business problem, heal every relationship, remove depression, or make me spiritually mature. It created enough clarity to face what alcohol had helped me postpone.

The goal was not to be sober for all eternity in one heroic decision.

The goal was to obey today.

Then repeat.

One Glass of Wine

As I approached one year, the same mind that had used “tomorrow” to create freedom began looking for another loophole.

One night in prayer, I thought:

God, what would happen if I drank one glass of wine?

I heard nothing.

No warning. No thunder. No dramatic interruption. No new instruction.

Just silence.

I treated the silence as permission.

That is one of the most important details in this story. God had already made the direction clear. I did not receive a new answer releasing me from it.

I asked whether I could reopen the door and decided that the absence of another “no” meant yes.

God’s silence was not permission to renegotiate what He had already made clear.

The glass itself was not magic. It did not erase the previous year or prove that the sobriety had been fake. Recovery does not become meaningless because a person returns to an old behavior.

The deeper change happened in the agreement.

My posture moved from:

If You said it, I will obey.

To:

If You do not stop me again, I will do what I want.

Alcohol returned to the roles it knew how to play. Celebration. Pressure. Travel. Stress. Pain. Disappointment. Numbing. Over the following years, I found myself asking the darker “Why me?” more often and experiencing again how alcohol could pull me toward depression and isolation.

One glass did not create every later problem by itself.

But the negotiation reopened access.

Tomorrow had finally arrived, and I collected the drink.

The old cycle was waiting.

Grace Is Not Disgusted by the Return

Ben Fuller’s “Black Sheep” belongs beside this story because it describes someone convinced he does not fit, wearing pain openly, acting hard, wandering, and trying to repair with alcohol and pills what those things cannot heal.

The good news is not that the black sheep finally developed enough discipline to impress the flock.

The good news is that the Shepherd did not stop pursuing him.

Grace can be irritating that way.

We wander, hide, rebel, numb, negotiate, relapse, build walls, and assume God will eventually become tired of coming after us. Then His mercy appears again in the ditch we chose.

The song does not excuse destruction. Love does not call the ditch a home. The Shepherd comes to rescue, correct, carry, restore, and return the sheep to life with Him and the flock.

Being a black sheep is not permission to remain isolated, addicted, or proud of surviving alone.

It means being loved in the very place where shame said love would never look.

Grace did not wait for me to become sober before deciding I was worth finding.

That matters because shame makes recovery sound like a debt we must pay before returning to God. It tells us to get clean, repair everything, prove consistency, and then approach the Shepherd.

But we do not clean ourselves so He will come.

We respond because He already came.

A Place Where Things Are Better

After having children, I reference cartoons and animated movies more than I ever expected because that is much of what we watch.

In The Croods, Guy talks about Tomorrow as a place different from today and yesterday—a place where things are better. He keeps moving toward the light because he believes another kind of life exists beyond the darkness and fear the family has accepted as normal.

One short instruction captures it:

“Follow the light and you’ll find your tomorrow.”

I like that image because sobriety can feel impossible when today is the only life a person remembers. The drinking friends, bar, routine, evening relief, celebration ritual, travel pattern, and identity can seem like the whole world. Walking away feels less like removing a beverage and more like leaving a country without proof another one exists.

Tomorrow becomes the belief that a different life is possible.

Not a perfect life.

Not a painless life.

Not a life where temptation never speaks, grief never returns, or consequences vanish.

A clearer life.

A present life.

A life where difficult emotions can be faced instead of continually delayed.

A life where relationships meet the real person rather than the version managed by intoxication, recovery, secrecy, or shame.

A life where the next faithful decision is not waiting behind a lifetime guarantee.

The light does not always show the full map.

It shows enough for the next step.

Sober Again

As I write this, I am sober again.

This current stretch began with the arrival of our last child, and the full story of that turning point belongs in another Field Note.

I do not say that as a man who has conquered every future day.

I say it as a man who has today.

The previous sober year was real. The return to alcohol was real. The darker years were real. The current sobriety is real. Grace does not require me to force the entire story into either victory or failure.

I can tell the truth about all of it.

I can admit that alcohol was present across more of my life than I wanted to see. I can admit that being functional was not the same as being free. I can admit that tolerance was not strength, and my ability to outdrink people was not a win.

I can also refuse to let the years behind me vote on today’s decision.

Tomorrow is not a finish line where I will finally become worthy.

Tomorrow is what another faithful today begins to build.

I do not have to win sobriety forever today. I have to stop giving tomorrow permission to make today’s decision.

You Are Enough to Tell the Truth

Before I tell more alcohol-driven stories—the humiliating ones, dangerous ones, expensive ones, and moments I still do not completely understand—I need to say something clearly.

Every person and every situation is different.

What worked for me may not be the exact method another person needs.

Some people can change a habit with a decision and support. Some need medical care to stop safely. Some need treatment, medication, counseling, recovery groups, trauma work, spiritual direction, residential care, or more than one attempt. Some will use the word alcoholic. Others will use alcohol use disorder. Some are still trying to determine what relationship alcohol has with their pain.

Do not use my story to measure whether your struggle is legitimate.

Do not use my cold-turkey confidence to shame yourself for needing help.

Do not use a recurrence to declare that freedom was never real.

You are enough to tell the truth now.

That does not mean you are self-sufficient or that consequences do not matter. It means your value is not waiting on the clean version of you to arrive. God’s love is not standing at the finish line refusing to move until you complete recovery alone.

The Good Shepherd comes into the ditch.

He does not leave you there.

The numbness will slowly kill parts of you while convincing you it is keeping you alive.

Stop running.

Face the darkness.

Tell somebody.

Receive help.

Obey today.

Tomorrow can become a place where things are better.

But the door is today.

A dangerous person is not someone who promises never to struggle again.

It is someone who refuses to let tomorrow keep stealing today’s obedience.

Scripture to Carry

Matthew 6:34 — Do not carry tomorrow’s trouble before tomorrow arrives. Today already has an assignment and grace of its own.

Hebrews 3:15 — When God’s voice is heard today, do not harden the heart through delay.

Lamentations 3:22–23 — God’s mercy is renewed every morning. Yesterday’s failure does not exhaust today’s mercy.

1 Corinthians 10:13 — Temptation is not unique, and God provides a way to endure it rather than treating the urge as an unavoidable command.

2 Corinthians 12:9 — Grace is sufficient, and God’s strength meets us honestly inside weakness.

Your Next Act of Obedience

Write these two sentences:

“Alcohol tells me I need it today because __________.”

“The freedom I keep postponing until tomorrow is __________.”

Then write one action that belongs to today.

It may be telling a trusted person the complete truth, contacting a healthcare professional, scheduling an assessment, removing alcohol from your environment with support, declining an event, blocking a delivery method, joining a recovery meeting, or asking someone to remain with you through the next difficult period.

Do not create a medically unsafe plan from a motivational moment.

Finally, complete the central line in your own handwriting:

“I do not have to win forever today. Today, I will __________.”

Prayer

Father, thank You for meeting me today. Thank You that I do not have to carry every future temptation, celebration, loss, lonely night, and painful memory at the same time.

Forgive me for using tomorrow to delay the freedom You placed in front of me today. Forgive me for calling tolerance strength, functionality freedom, and secrecy control. Show me every role alcohol has been playing and every wound I have asked it to cover.

Bring me back to what You already made clear. Protect me from turning silence into permission and from reopening doors simply because You did not repeat the warning. Give me wisdom to test what I believe I heard through Scripture, truth, wise counsel, and the fruit it produces.

Thank You for the sober days that were real, even when they were followed by recurrence. Thank You that grace is not disgusted by my return. Remove the shame that keeps me hiding, but preserve the humility that keeps me honest and supported.

Give me courage to receive whatever help this freedom requires. Protect anyone for whom sudden withdrawal could be dangerous. Lead them toward qualified care, safe support, and people who will remain present without condemnation.

When forever feels impossible, bring me into the next hour. When the next hour feels impossible, meet me in the next five minutes. Let today’s obedience build a tomorrow that no longer needs to be numbed.

I place my appetite, pain, celebration, memories, body, mind, marriage, children, and future in Your hands.

The beer can remain free tomorrow.

Today, I choose freedom.

In Jesus’ name, amen.

Music Connection

“Black Sheep” — Ben Fuller

The song gives a voice to the person who wanders, acts hard, carries private tears, wears pain openly, and discovers that alcohol and pills cannot repair what is broken underneath.

Its deepest contribution to this Field Note is the pursuing Shepherd. The black sheep may believe everyone would be better without him. He may confuse isolation with strength and rebellion with identity. But Jesus does not accept the conclusion that the wanderer is disposable.

The Shepherd’s love does not merely affirm the sheep in the ditch. It refuses to leave him there.