Balance in Recovery
The AA Program and living sober is a balance of being willing, being wise and working. Drawing closer to God – the God of our understanding – is the fulcrum of well-balanced sobriety.
I’ve come to know, believe, and trust God is bigger than the work I do in AA, or the church I attend. But, to skip over the Twelve Steps, miss meetings or worship is like putting a plastic bag over my head and wondering where the oxygen went.
This summer, doing too much took a wee toll. I felt dry and doubtful: a setup for slip, emotional or actual.
So, I have spent time studying the Bible with a small group and, on my own, following a friend’s directed study. Here’s a link: Retreat: A Deeper View of Jesus.
If you wonder or doubt Christ’s ability to be the strength that you need in recovery, this is a straightforward look at His character, wisdom and power. I also recommend retreating into the New Testament to meet or reacquaint yourself with a Friend.
A more formal study was in the Old Testament, on Jonah. The unexpected blessing of rereading a well-known shortbook has been reassessing God’s compassion on people – His own, and those who have yet to see their need for Him.
Recovery Help In Scripture
Sometimes – even after working Steps Six and Seven, I fret I am too sinful, stupid, or whatever for God to have an interest in me. Other times I get cocky and think, well, I am not so bad. Studying Jonah was like a welcome Wake-Up and Smell the coffee! slap: Sinful, soul-sick people don’t worry God. Nor, do folks who believe they aren’t so bad impress Him.
I still don’t know if Jonah ever turned himself over to God. But reading about his self-centered plans made me think of my own plans – the ones I make while Life happens. (Thank you John Lennon)
My own plans . . . the happiest plans I have enjoyed are the ones I let go of, and let God have them. The saddest are the ones I refused to give over to Him for healing.
Making plans to soak in God’s grace, revealed in Scripture, may require readjusting your priorities. But, tipping the balance of time management in favor of time with God, will not throw you off kilter.
Come to the Bible, not to study the history of God’s divine action, but to be its object; not to learn what it has achieved throughout the centuries and still does, but simply to be the subject of its operation. ~Jean-Pierre de Caussade (1675-1751)
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