I Will Give To You.......................

Acts 1:8

But you shall receive power (ability, efficiency, and might) when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and to the ends

(the very bounds) of the earth.

Over the past few days, God has taken me on this journey through two books.

1.) The Bible

2.) The big book of A.A.

One, the Bible, being the infallible word of the living God,

and the other, big book of A.A., the thoughts and understanding of a man who was delivered from the power of alcohol.

Because the call God has given to me involves serving people in addiction, I find that the Bible is revealing some truth that the big book shares.

I chose the verse of Acts 1:8 because this is where my journey has begun.

Monday afternoon as I was mowing, I was talking to God.

(Before you think me crazy, I have some of my best conversations with God while mowing.)

During the course of our time together, He brought the Acts 1:8 passage to my mind.
I wasn't dwelling on Acts.

I had not even been reading in that particular book.
But there it was in my mind......."Acts 1:8"

Suddenly I saw it in a way I had never seen before.

Acts 1:8 contains the very essence of the Twelve Steps.

It has Step#1 ( the beginning)

and

Step # 12 ( the ending)

It begins with Jesus saying to his disciples, I am going to give you something.
What?
Power.

Step # 1 involves the recognition , the confession and admittance that we are powerless.
God does for us what we could not do for ourselves...He gives us power.
This power, the Holy Ghost, is the one who brings change to us.

It is the beginning of a relationship between us and God.

Then at the end of Acts 1:8 Jesus states that "You will be my witnesses" and we are too take his message to the world.

Step #12 tells us that "having had this spiritual awakening, we seek to take the message."
Here is the part that I think the church misses.

A person in recovery takes the message to others because in the very act of doing so, it helps them to remain sober, strong, and on the right track.

What if this idea that the reason we share is not only because Jesus commanded us to, but there was a benefit that strengthened us and helped us to not fall back into our old ways and lifestyles.
That the reason for taking the message to others was that it enabled you to remain strong and on the right track.

Think on these things.

God on you........

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The Real Prescription

From Dr. Bob Smith, one of the co founders of A.A.

His own personal prescription for recovery.

1.) Trust God -  Steps # 1 - 3

2.) Clean House --  Steps # 4 - 11

3.) Help Others -  Step # 12

So simple.

We begin our journey with the cold hard truth that we are powerless.
We may have certain areas in our life that we feel as though we are able to retain some

power and control...

Our addiction left unchecked will certainly spill over to the areas we are able to control. It is sure certainty that they too will become destroyed because of the drinking and drugging.

I think God said it perfectly in Deuteronomy 2:2 -

And the LORD spoke to me, saying:"You have skirted this mountain long enough..turn northward."

I had done the same behaviors over and over and over and nothing has changed.
In fact things have gotten worse.

It took God speaking to me to help me understand that there was a better way than my own personal choices.

Jesus is the answer.

Pretty simple...huh?

Over the years my theology has remained constant.
It's Just Jesus!

So Thanks to Dr. Bob Smith and Bill Wilson for sitting down in the house in Akron, Ohio back in 1935.
For sitting down and talking. That's all...just talking.

One drunk talking to another drunk.
What they came away with was something unique that was not born from the heart of man.

God on you.........

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# 700 Posting

I Thessalonians 5:8

But let us, who are of the day, be SOBER, putting on the breastplate of faith

and love, and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.

Be sober.

Be clearheaded.
Be discreet.

Be vigilant.

These are not attitudes and behaviors done under the influence.

Yet, here in Scripture, God calls us to let these be character traits that define the work of the

Holy Spirit in us.

I like how the verse starts.

It defines who we are...
We are (having been saved) children of the day.

Children of light.
Children who have no place in darkness.
Amazing how much you can see in the daytime.
Amazing what you can't see in the darkness.
Maybe that is why most sin....most drinking and drugging....most partying....takes place

in the darkness.

You won't find any nightclubs that are lit like a football stadium.

Oh, they may have the light show...

not the same.
Why?
Because sin and evil thrive in darkness.

We shun the light when we are moving in our addiction.
We shun the light but are completely miserable with the darkness.

There is a great movie about a battle between the forces of evil

and the good people of a rural town.

The EVIL makes the statement to one of the townspeople that

"Your cries for fairness and tears for life that is filled with pain is like butter to our bread."

This is why I must not only surrender my will and life to God,

but live daily according to his Word.

I must live as a child of the light.

Making myself stay in a place where I will be exposed if

I try and run back to the darkness.

Not exposed so I can be punished,

but exposed from the heart of a heavenly Father who loves me so much that He is not going to

let me get away with anything.

Today....I am sober.

Today.....I am a child of light.

God on you..

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The Love of God - Ryan Delmore (fan video)

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up.
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God so loved the world , that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.

How amazing that an incident that took place over 2000 years ago still resonates in the hearts of men and women around this world even today as I post this. I can't explain how it works all I know is like the blind man Jesus healed....."I was blind.....now I see." I was living in a darkness that consumed me heart, body, soul, mind and purpose." I could not save myself no matter how hard I wanted to or tried. I was doomed to a punishment that I could understand with my head but not my heart. What punishment? To be eternally separated from a God who loved me so much that He provided the way out from this punishment. Not only that, the way out was so much more than I had ever considered. It involved this God putting a part of himself inside of me to act as a "voice" of reason and guidance. He gave me abundant life here and now and provided me eternal life after I draw my last breath.

Today, I am grateful for such a God as this. A God that is beyond my understanding even though I will never stop pursuing Him. A God that is capable of doing anything in my life, according to His will, that goes far beyond my understanding or imagination.

A God who transcends governments or culture to reach down into the people to bring healing and restoration. My allegiance first and foremost is to the LORD God. He ransomed me from my own future and has given me direction and purpose. This is the God I write about here at Greene Street Letters. My love for Him is such that I wish I could invent new words to describe Him...the ones I have seem to grow weary and dull and do not convey the beauty of God.

Some call me delusional and out of touch. To this I reply, "OH that God would lay hold of those who say such things that they become delusional and out of touch and never recover from it!" Today...let this be the real INDEPENDENCE day that God declares you set free from the kingdom of darkness.

Praise God!

God on you today!
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End Of The Old Week--- Now We Have A New Start

Mark 1:1 (NLT)
Here begins the Good News About Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.

Each Saturday night as we meet here at Rapha, my prayer is that someone has a "beginning" with Jesus.
That no matter how steeped they are in religion...
No matter what their background....
They may be awakened to Jesus.
Every Saturday night is a time for us to come together corporately and seek Jesus.
To worship Him.
To praise Him.
To turn loose of "us" and grab hold of Him.
Now this may sound like an effort on our part, but trust me all we truly do is respond to the Holy Spirit. If we are not invited into the presence of Jesus, then all we have accomplished is to have a meeting.

Each Saturday night we get to take stock of the past week and see how we have done.
Have grown spiritually?
Has our character changed for the better?
Do we struggle with the same things over and over?
We have an opportunity to pray (as a group) --receive prayer for what we are dealing with,and hopefully move onward and upward in our relationship with Jesus.

Each week is different and we truly do not know what to expect, other than God showing up.
We merely want to respond to what He wants.
Sometimes our lessons are thrown out the window and we follow where the Spirit says go.
Someone may have a verse or maybe a prayer.
We want to remain open to where God is taking us.
We bring a structure and a plan to what we think we need to do on Saturday nights, but we hold it loosely and allow God to move should He desire to.

Psalm 32:1-2
Oh, what joy for those whose rebellion is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight.
Yes, what joy for those whose record the LORD has cleared of sin.
Whose lives are lived in complete honesty.

God on you.....
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There's a Stirring

We spend so much time looking from the outside that we miss the stirring on the inside. The tug and pull of the Holy Ghost opening us up to God's voice.

"Listen! I'm talking," He says. We go on looking with our natural eyes. Once again..."Listen! I'm talking to you." God continues to stir our spirits. A divine dance takes place within us as the God of heaven and earth brings forth from us that which he desires.

There may not be language to the stirring other than "I AM AT WORK IN YOU". But we know something is happening. SO we wait. We worship. We pray. We wait as the stirring grows stronger and the Spirit's voice becomes clearer. Even at this point our words may simply be......."I feel as though God is saying....................."

"There a stirring deep within me.....Could it be my time has come."

God on you...

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The Heart Of The Matter

Recovery is a "hot" word now days. Has been for a while. When I say it is a hot word or topic, I mean that there are a lot of churches today that are focusing efforts on helping those who are addicted to drugs and alcohol. What I have found in most cases is that people are ignorant concerning addiction. I hear everything from "You just got to stop using" to "Jesus will save you."
While it is true that Jesus will save you, what we have seen is that Jesus will not stop you from getting drunk.
When confronted by the Pharisees with the woman they had caught in adultery, Jesus told her to "go and sin no more." In other words, don't put yourself in places where you may be tempted to participate in this sin again. Stay away from men who see only to have sex with you. Sin no more.
For an addict that means cutting off what we refer to as "Playgrounds and playmates".  There are hard choices made about the people they can associate with. Choices about places they can and cannot go. Under the guidance of God's Holy Spirit, the addict has the guidance and empowerment to choose rightly, but it begins with learning to be follow. Learning to be disciplined in life and not living it based on emotions or feeling, but by the Spirit.

There is a term used in the book Becoming Recovered that I really like. On page 4 it reads like this..."The gift of desperation is the great motivator. People who cling to the program of action described in the big book (A.A.) with this gift of desperation, tend to be thorough and dedicated to their recovery. Those of us who were less desperate tended to test the limits of this program to see what we could get away with. Any time we felt a little relief during this process, we stopped our work and slowly fell back to our old ways of thinking.  We wanted to get what we could from this book and then get on with out lives. We treated this work as a trick to maintain abstinence rather than a path of spiritual transformation. We didn't want change. We didn't want to help other people. We just wanted to feel better and be done with it."

Jesus did for me what I could not do for myself.
I wanted to stop.
I wanted to be clean and whole, but I couldn't.
From this place of total darkness and depression came a cry...."Oh God, I can't do this. I need you. Come and save me."
This begins the new life.
The new path.
The new way.
And as we arise each day, sober.......possessing this new life, all we have to do is maintain it for 24 hours.
But during that 24 hours we must truly live "recovery at all costs."

IF you are struggling today with addiction, please drop me a note or post here on this blog.
My E-mail address is     rapha7@bellsouth.net.
My cell phone number is   256-490-1868.
Don't wait another day.
If you have read this posting today and you feel that "quickening" inside of you to do something, that is the Spirit of God speaking to you. Don't wait.

God on you......
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