Recovered!

I got my britches in a twist a couple weeks ago when I posted what I thought was a thought-provoking question on the social network page of a recovery fellowship to which I belong, but it got shot down with impunity as though I was a schmuck off the street who didn’t have a clue what recovery was. I was simply trying to be poetic when I posed the question:

Considering the term “recovered” do you think we are more like a found lost coin or a reupholstered sofa?

I, myself, am both, but I was surprised at how defensive many people got about the word “recovered.” Those who could apparently not relate to my poetic language were quick to point out that we suffer from a very real disease, and delivery from it is neither trivial like a coin nor trashy like worn out furniture. I thought maybe I threw gasoline on somebody’s lit match. So let me explain where my mind was when I penned the question.

Jesus told a parable of a woman who lost a coin worth a tenth of her life savings. The woman searched high and low, sweeping her whole house until she found it, then called all her friends and threw a “lookie what I found!” party. Christ said there is just such a party when a sinner repents. (Luke 15:8-10) I’m that kind of lost and found coin. God celebrates over me, because I was lost but now I am that kind of recovered.

My mother and my wife both are skilled in sewing and the art of upholstery. I have seen old pieces of furniture given new life with new fabric. It is a joining of “they don’t make them like that anymore” sturdy quality with the fresh look of a whole new covering. I am that kind of sofa. I’ve got something underneath worth redeeming. I’m not trash. I have no business on the street or in a garbage heap. God found something in me worth holding onto, but He loves me too much to keep me the way I was. He is gently recreating me, starting with the frame of what I was but clothing me in kindness, gentleness, and love, adorning me with all the wondrous fruits of the Spirit woven into a fabric of His mercy. I am that kind of recovered.

Also, I am a compulsive overeater, blessed with abstinence today, and fitting myself to be of maximum service to God and those about me, freed from the obsessions of my past, and able to walk through my kitchen, drugstore, or market without pouring or pouting over what is no longer my food, but have turned my attention to the help I can be. I have divorced myself resolutely from the cookies, cakes, candies, ice-cream, and nachos that once were my bedfellows. They have packed their bags and found someone else to haunt. I’m over them, and though I weigh and measure what is mine to keep from substituting God’s providence for my entertainment, I am that kind of recovered.

“We, of Alcoholics Anonymous, are more than one hundred men and women who have recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body.” (Forward to the “Big Book” of Alcoholics Anonymous)

Resist Temptation with Prayer

  There he told them, “Pray that you will not give in to temptation.” (‭Luke‬ ‭22‬:‭40‬ NLT)

What a great prayer, to rely on the One who can hold us and rescue us even in mid fall! It is not so arrogant as the toddler who insists he can do a grown up task “all by myself.” On my own, I can neither breathe nor stand, let alone resist the chemical and biological signals and triggers of a body so long abused by indulgence and the manipulation of a greedy marketplace. Many have asked me, “What should I pray?” Toddler pilgrim, here is a good place to start; seasoned traveler, here too is a good place to return. Pray that you will not give in to temptation.

Holy Father, today, lead me not into temptation; but if Your will is that I should walk through the valley, be my rod and staff to comfort me; lead me through by Your grace to greener pastures and make me lie beside still waters. The turbulence of this world we will shortly endure. Grant me grace to know I’m never outside Your care. Keep me from falling into self-service while I seek to follow You.

Build From Bottom Up

  “But among you it will be different. Those who are the greatest among you should take the lowest rank, and the leader should be like a servant.” (‭Luke‬ ‭22‬:‭26‬ NLT)
The service structure of a Twelve-Step Fellowship is modeled after this Kingdom rule. Service is bottom-up, not condescending. The invisible honor that results is contrary to Earth’s understanding, and looks upside-down, but it isn’t. The things of Heaven are unseen (Colossians 1:16), and so it is with spiritual living while on Earth. We are blessed for the purpose of service, and I am only content when I am giving myself in worship of my Creator by serving His other creations.

“A wise woman builds her home, but a foolish woman tears it down with her own hands. Those who follow the right path fear the LORD; those who take the wrong path despise him.” (‭Proverbs‬ ‭14‬:‭1-2‬ NLT)
I believe either of these verses could stand alone, but together they pose a parallel that amplifies the meaning of the second one by the word picture of the first. Failure for me to follow Lord Jesus Christ is the same folly as if I were to rip apart my own house in a violent fit. The use of a woman in the first picture demonstrates the social expectation of stewardship. It isn’t just any resident of the house going all Tazmanian Devil on it, but the housekeeper herself! I am my own life’s housekeeper, and so the choice to build or destroy, to follow or despise, is mine.

Holy Father, today, I choose to follow Your lead to love sacrificially, to serve others and, by extension, You. You are my motivation to breathe, move, fuel, plan, and act. Save me from selfish reaction today, and guide me under Your grace to peace. Cause my living to reflect Your loving care, and brighten my light so others will know You. In Christ Jesus’ name, amen!

Striving for Purity, not Perfection

“But just as all the good things the Lord your God has promised you have come to you, so he will bring on you all the evil things he has threatened, until the Lord your God has destroyed you from this good land he has given you.” (Joshua 23:15, NIV)

“I have sworn an oath to David, and in my holiness I cannot lie.” (Psalm 89:35, NIV)

These verses should be effective in wiping away a common misconception about God that is comfortable to entertain: the one that paints God as merely a warm and fuzzy grandfather-type who lets us have our way and who, consequently, disappoints us when our every wish isn’t materialized. God demands holiness of Himself and, while He has instituted grace as a covering for imperfection, He has been clear that obedience toward holiness is still our part of the covenant. Any doubt of that should be clarified in His declaration in Psalm 89. (The whole chapter seems to address this issue.) Joshua was clear to Israel just as Moses was when he laid before them the choice between life and death (Deuteronomy 30:19), and it should be clear to this generation’s children of Heaven too.

I can Twelve-Step my holiness problem this way: 1) I am powerless over sin, and my life is (by my power) unmanageable; 2) I believe God can deliver and restore me to sane living and abundant life; 3) I make a conscious decision to turn over to God everything I am, have, and will become, to live for His purposes rather than my whims; etcetera, through the Twelve Steps. As long as I am carried by a body of meat I will be prone to human decay, and while Earth’s gravity holds me I will stand imperfectly on this rock, but I have the hope of relationship with a Creator who is not content to leave me alone until He perfects me for eternal unity with Him (Philippians 1:6).

To reach for holiness, I have to look at sin differently through eyes of grace. Sin includes anything outside God’s perfect will for me, not just the firebrands I once used to convict others and make myself feel superior – murder, robbery, adultery, and the like. I sin when I think self-serving thoughts – not just lust, but laziness, pride, self-satisfying cravings. To don this attitude toward sin without the undergarment of grace would be to fling all hope into despair, because the consequence of sin is always death. Not to apply it, however, is to be a friend of the world and enemy of holiness, and I cannot bear to tolerate my enmity with God while His is the relationship I most fervently seek to maintain.

Holy Father, today, while I celebrate all the progress with which you have blessed me, I acknowledge that there is nothing I have or am that You did not create, that You do not own, and that You could not take away. I align myself with You. Thank you for accepting me, faults and all. Now make me more acceptable to You by whatever means You determine necessary. I submit. Clean out the closets of my heart, all my secret places. Shine light into my darkness and sweep away the debris of my shame. Make me aware of anything that remains for me to address, and give me grace to address it according to Your will. Be glorified in who I am and what I do. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen!

Alabaster jar or clay pot – it’s got to be emptied

The NT in a year reading today contained Ephesians 5: 8, “For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light”

It caught me that the verse doesn’t say I was “in” darkness, but that I “was” darkness. I am now not merely walking in light, but I “am” that light. The next verse explains it in more detail, that the fruit of light is light. I like it, but I have more meditating to do about that.

Yesterday, I had a thought while at YoGod (a Christ-centered, worshipful, yoga experience). Joye, our facilitator, read about the broken alabaster jar of nard that was poured out onto Jesus at the home of Simon the Leper. The devotional she read pointed out that the jar, an expensive product itself, had to be broken before the precious contents could be spilled out. While that was certainly a picture of what was about to happen to Jesus, the most precious of vessels issuing forth the most precious of anointing, it is also true of me. I more closely associate with the clay pots of Gideon than with any priceless jar, but the fact remains that I must be broken before what is inside, whether actually valuable or just prized by me for a temporary occasion, can be poured out. It is also only then, when I am broken and completely poured out onto Jesus, that I become the blessing to Him I was created to be, and come into the relationship I was built to maintain. I am broken and poured out, so that I can accept, freehanded, what Jesus was broken and poured out. I empty myself of me, and He empties Himself for and to me. I am all I am, and have all I have, for, to and because of Him. I do so love my Jesus! I do so wish to please Him.

Holy Father, make me more like the One to whom I belong – Christ Jesus, Your Son. Thank You for grace. Help me live in it and love with it.

I started today poorly, griping about the sleep I did not get, but You, who make all things new, please help me start again, lovingly sacrificing myself to the world around me rather than trying to claim what parts of it I feel are mine.