This Daily Retreat

The thing about food is that we’ve eventually got to eat it or it molds and rots and becomes worthless.

What we really have, to quote the Big Book, is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.

It should come as no surprise that the Bible was one of the primary source texts for the writing of the Big Book of AA. It was deeply instrumental in dumbing down the spiritual principals by which the recovering addict can learn to live in sobriety.

The idea of a daily reprieve, of living one day at a time, of focusing on the present, on not drifting into remorse and self-pity…these are deeply ingrained in the Christian way of life even if many professing believers don’t themselves live by it.

AA old timers would tell me that whoever got up earlier that day had the most sobriety. That what I did yesterday wouldn’t keep me on the beam today. That this way of life required the daily repetition of spiritual living.

Sounds a lot like the “boring” practices of Christianity that I was quick to walk away from back in high school.

Wake up. Read the Word. Seek the truth. Pray for guidance and direction. Meditate on things that are good. Seek forgiveness when I screw up. Make amends.

This is a piece of living one day at a time.

This is a piece of seeking after our daily bread.

Don’t let it spoil, though. It’s a use it or lose it situation.

Every day is a day when I must seek his will for me by spending time with him and praying to him and attuning my life toward his will for me.

God, give me the persistence of an eager child to seek you today.