What a crazy past few days! It’s been rainy and sunny. The cold and wind ended up knocking out the power for several hours and of course it was during the time I had put aside to spend knocking out some blog posts. But of course. So, here I am, late, at the end of a long week, pulling it together and thankful for your continued readership.

It’s been on my heart a lot in the past week or so. The tendency of well-meaning church folk and Christians in general to urge those of us with serious addictions and dysfunctions to just pray more, read the bible more and things will get better.

Well, maybe if you are having a momentary struggle with sin, or some temporary set-back in your faith. But if you, like me have deep-seated addiction and dysfunction in your life and in those you love and must deal with on a day-to-day basis, then an answer like pray more or read your bible more is the moral equivalent of telling a cancer patient they will be healed if they just have more faith. Which makes me want to scream, cry and basically smack someone (insert amends here).

No, I’m sorry. God gave us brains, medicine, medical professionals and the 12 steps. He also gave us the ability to make decisions to pursue better choices where our physical, mental and emotional health is concerned (this applies to competent adults. Those who have developmental disabilities and other challenges are another story, and that’s not what I’m referring to here).

When our insides are wonky, regardless of how much we pray and read the word, especially as it pertains to addiction and dysfunction, we need the help a recovery program provides. Imagine handing a large box of parts to someone along with a book, and telling them there’s a car in there, they just have to put it together. Well, I know for me, recovery taught me how to use tools to make sense of how to put the car together. Otherwise, it was a nice idea, but I looked at that box of car parts for a long time before it began to make sense to me.

God placed friends in my life along with the tools of recovery so that we could all work together to get the job done. But the wonder of it is, it is never “done”…we are always working on the next version of our recovery, kind of like recovery 2.5.

I am so grateful for the many people who are part of where I am now, and I give thanks in advance for those I haven’t even met yet who will be part of my future story.

Much Love.