Biblical law is exemplified in the old testament, in the time before Christ. It is important to understand that the days of biblical law are over. Christ’s life was a turning point for humanity itself. Christ’s sacrifice did away with the law and replaced it with grace forever so that humanity could have access to God. Prior to this pivotal moment, animal sacrifices were made as a means of atoning human behavior, and the law of scripture was in place over mankind.

In this time, the time of the old testament, judgment on an addict would have been much different. Without the life of Christ, the law of scripture would still be the way of deciding who is worthy of God’s presence. Everyone who has ever walked the earth, save for Jesus, would fail this test. No perfect person has ever existed because people are not capable of perfection. The trouble is, God is perfect, and there is no way to exist in the same place as him with our imperfections. The answer to the trouble was the life of Christ. His sacrifice was what reunited us with God.

Every type of wrong doing, from addiction to theft to anger, would have been held to the full extent of the moral law. Addiction can be likened to the biblical sin of worshiping a false idol. Anything you place over God in your life will result in your spiritual death. If you place alcohol, drugs or sex in the seat of importance in your life, it will cause you spiritual devastation. Any investment you make in life that is not godly can destroy you. God created us to be perfect through him, but when we chose a path of free will and sin and wandered away from him, our potential for perfection was destroyed. For the sake of mankind, God sent his son to live and die to restore us to him, so that we would not sentence ourselves to death through our own sinful nature.