- Progress and Perfection
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- Finished Peace
TRUTH
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.
James 1:17
REFLECTION
A lot of time is wasted trying to analyze the edges of God.
A lot of energy is misplaced trying to correlate the idea of God with the actuality of God.
In recovery, it’s important to inch toward understanding.
It’s important to define what we are putting our hope in.
It’s important to walk with purpose rather than blindly trudging toward another dangerous clifftop.
But it’s also necessary to hold these ideas a bit more loosely than our ideals might want. We are conceding defeat to a life run on self-propulsion, and it’ll do little good to insert too much of ourselves into our ideas about God.
Better to have much mystery and greater reverence than a codified idea with no room for majesty.
What many get wrong at this crossroads is an over-emphasis on belief and an under-emphasis on action.
If God exists, we should not be able to fully comprehend God. He is edge-less, infinite, eternal.
Instead of tripping on these gigantic details, we can experiment. Much like we tried drinking and drugging to see what all the fuss was about, we can try on the propositions of spirituality and religion.
They don’t seem to be going anywhere. Scholars and laypeople throughout the centuries swear by them. Wars have been fought over them.
This is where step-work in recovery shines. We can take a look and find out whether there’s any merit to these ideas.
If we’re honest, we realize we’ve not given these ideas a fair try until now.
Recovery is more callous than the church in this regard: give this an honest effort for 90 days and you can always go back if you’re unsatisfied. Misery is fully refundable.
God, keep me on this side of recovery.
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NEXT
When you’re ready, here are some tools for you:
Book List (amazon link)
Some of my favorite reads related to recovery and/or wrestling with faith.4th Step Guide (free download)
A PDF with instructions and worksheets for a thorough 4th step. Straight from the Big Book. Fearlessness not included.12-Step Christianity (YouTube)
My thoughts on the parallels between discipleship and sponsorship.
KEEP LEANING FORWARD
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