Alcohol

“Rebuilding Relationships in Recovery” – Workshop Transcript

note: You may discuss this workshop in the Message Boards HERE

Obie-Host Welcome to the “Rebuilding Relationships in Recovery” Workshop
Please join me in welcoming Chaplain Michael Clark who will be leading the workshop. He is involved with Shadows of the Cross Ministries as well as Prison and Recovery Ministry. Chaplain Clark is a noted Speaker and Writer, Addiction Counselor/Professional as well as a Recovery Support Specialist. He will speak for several minutes after which we will open the floor for questions and comments from you for Chaplain Clark.

Let us open in prayer this evening.

Heavenly Father,
We ask Your blessings upon Chaplain Clark as he leads this workshop today.

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Early Recovery: Getting on Track

Early recovery is a rough time because so many things going on at the same time. Your body is in withdrawal from years of chemical and alcohol abuse, your feelings start to rebound and you might have to deal with family and other issues that were put on hold all of the time that you were lost in the insanity of the disease of addiction and alcoholism.

Many things are going on at the same time and it seems impossible to juggle everything and plus take time to focus on health or nutrition. Who wants to spend even 5 minutes using cleansers or eating right when the best thing that you might be able to manage all day is just getting some fast food and a pack of cigarettes.

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How Can I Deal with My Alcoholic Spouse?

Ask Angie: I have been married to an alcoholic for 16 years. I have detached in love and have been very active in my church and creating a life for me and my children outside of the alcoholism. The alcoholic in my life doesn’t seem to mind any of this and it actually seems to relieve him from the responsibility to be a dad and husband. He does work hard on his job and so he feels that’s all of his responsibility and likes when he’s home to drink all day and play video games and ignore us. I hate being with him. It’s a very lonely marriage. My two older children are becoming more upset by his lack of desire to be with them.

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Healing Your Body after Addiction

When the addiction stops and the body starts to heal, there is the underlying issue of what has the addiction cost? Everybody is familiar with the exercise where you put down on paper how much financial wreckage there is that you have to deal with, but I am not talking about that.

This is a discussion about the wreckage of your body. That’s right the wreckage of you. Skin care and skin health have usually been compromised to the point where many people have scars and other telltale signs that remind them of how bad it really was.

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A.A., the “Higher Powers,” and the New Thought Compromise

My Search for the Curious Nonsense “gods” Floating Around Recovery Talk

As many know by now, my searches for the history of A.A. began when a young man told me when I was three years sober that A.A. had come from the Bible. I told him I had never heard such a thing in the thousand or more meetings I had attended. He then suggested I read the A.A. General Service Conference-approved book, DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers; Which I did. And the young man was right.

Then, as many have also heard, I realized that A.A. had many roots. Some had never been researched. Some were scarcely known in the Fellowship. Some had systematically and intentionally been discarded; or, at best, they had been distorted.

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A.A. History Brief: Oxford Group Principles

What the Oxford Group Principles Were

Many within and without the Oxford Group have endeavored to describe the principles of the Oxford Group. One Australian Oxford Group writer spoke of eight principles of the Group. Bill Wilson sometimes spoke of six “Steps” of the Oxford Group. But the idea that the Oxford Group had any “Steps”-let alone six-was dispelled by Oxford Group historian and activist T. Willard Hunter. And repudiation of this idea was finally publicized in A.A.’s own “Pass It On” (NY: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1984), 206 n.2.

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Are the 12 Steps the Only Way?

Question:
Is it acceptable to have or receive a different approach than following the traditional Twelve Steps only?

In Christians in Recovery, the 12 Steps are only some of the tools available to those seeking recovery. The Bible and Biblical principles come first and foremost. CIR is not AA. Our Lord Jesus Christ and God Almighty are our “Higher Power.” The Bible is our handbook. The Holy Spirit is our Teacher and our Guide.

The 12 Steps are just tools. They work for some people and other people simply have no use for them. That is fine. If they work for you, by all means use them. Many people find the 12 Steps bring them into a closer relationship with God.

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Origins of the Christian Recovery Movement

Effective Christian Help for Drunks by Five Important Groups & Organizations in the 1800’s-long before A.A. was founded in 1935

Young Men’s Christian Association lay workers (1870). Non-denominational work
in revival meetings with conversions and Bible studies. Galvanized the Great Awakening of 1875 in St. Johnsbury. (Bob and Bill both had “Y” connections).

The Gospel Rescue Missions (1872) exemplified by Jerry McAuley and the Water Street Mission in NY, NY – followed by Calvary Rescue Mission where Bill and Ebby each separately made their decisions for Jesus Christ.

Evangelists and Revivalists (1875) Charles Finney, John B. Gough, Dwight Moody, Ira

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