Step 3

God Expects You To Be Better By Now (Resistance to Recovery)

See: Part 1 | See: Part 2

(The third in a three part series on resistance to recovery.)

In the first of this series of articles I emphasized that the most difficult form of resistance to recovery is our own resistance. Recovery is not easy. It is a difficult process. Telling the truth, acknowledging our need, accepting help, making amends – these are some of the difficult tasks of recovery. It is understandable that we resist such a difficult process. In addition, recovery involves change. We have spent many years practicing our dysfunctional ways of living. The path of least resistance for us is to keep doing the same old things. Change is difficult and it is understandable that we resist it. In the second in this series of articles, I emphasized that in addition to our own internal resistance to recovery, recovery also often takes place in a hostile environment. For a variety of reasons, not everyone in our lives will welcome the changes which recovery brings.


Many of us, unfortunately, have experienced some distinctively Christian forms of resistance to recovery and it is this kind of resistance which I would like begin to discuss in this article.

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Criticisms of Recovery – Part 2

See: Part 1 | See: Part 3

In a previous article I discussed the most insensitive, intransigent and personally painful kind of resistance to recovery – our own resistance. We tend to be our own worst critics. We resist the changes most tenaciously. In most cases we fight it, reject it, hate it – probably more than anyone else.

It is often true, however, that the recovery journey takes us through territory that is either ambivalent towards or downright hostile to recovery. Recovering codependents, for example, may find that some people prefer the ‘good old days’ when they were more compliant and self-sacrificing. Unpleasant emotions, once medicated with addictive substances or processes, may be experienced as threats to relationships that have adapted over the years to the insanity of addiction. Some people in recovery experience hostility when they start telling the truth in social systems which have been committed to silence for generations. Other people experience shame and rejection when people are skeptical about or merely uncomfortable with the changes that recovery brings.

Recovery is about change and most of us will encounter resistance when change produces new and unfamiliar behaviors. It is not reasonable to expect that all of the changes which take place during recovery will be received with rejoicing as if they were ‘answers to prayer’.

Resistance and Rejection
Most of the resistance we encounter in recovery will be personal and painful. Even when resistance comes in the form of intellectualized ‘arguments’ against recovery, it may feel like personal assault rather than dispassionate analysis. For example, suppose someone says: “You can’t change the past, so you should focus on the positive.” This may make some intellectual sense to you. It may ‘ring true.’ It might, indeed, be good advice at this particular stage of your recovery. But for many people it may also feel like a profound dismissal of their struggle towards sanity. The key to sorting out confusing stuff like this is not the truth or falsehood of “you should focus on the positive”. What is critically important is the tone of voice in which you hear “you should focus on the positive”. Is the tone practical and understanding? Or is it shaming and dismissing? Do I feel rejected as a person when I hear this?

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Criticisms of Recovery – Part 1

See: Part 2 | See: Part 3

Let’s begin with the obvious. The most argumentative, tenacious, illogical and misguided criticism of recovery comes not from other people but from me. When it comes to my own recovery journey, I am the person who resists the most. Like many of us, I have always been my own worst critic. I can think of 50 reasons, easily, why my recovery is just a pop-psychology, navel-gazing, trusting-the-wisdom-of-men-instead-of-God, self-pity-party.

I do not need any external hostility to recovery in order to remind me of how I should be better by now, of how I should be able to just pray about it and trust God, or of how I should spend more time helping others rather than selfishly focused on my own needs. I have yet to find a criticism of recovery that I haven’t already internalized in some way. I have recently finished reading a series of books highly critical of the recovery movement and there were few surprises for my personal Inner Board of Critics. This distinguished panel of Judges has left few stones unturned in criticizing my own recovery. I suppose there are some obvious reasons why we resist our own recovery so tenaciously. Let me mention just three.

Resistance to the Truth
First, of course, we experience denial as having such tangible benefits. Denial has a lot of appeal – it always seems like it’s going to be less painful than facing the truth. I’ve gotten along so far without having to face this, why should I have to deal with it now? The truth, by contrast, always seems like the worst possible thing. So, we resist recovery because it is less appealing than denial. This is, of course, why few of us choose recovery just as a kind of personal enrichment activity – most of us don’t begin the recovery journey until our pain becomes so intense that we are forced to take measures that in ordinary circumstances we would resist if at all possible.

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What Do You Think Jesus Wants You to Do?

“My Yoke Is Easy.”

What do you think Jesus wants you to do?

I’m not thinking of specific choices like whether to have pizza or turkey for lunch (I don’t think He cares). But in terms of overall life choices and directions, what do you think He wants? There are probably a lot of answers to that question, but I’m thinking of one right now that I’ll bet nobody else mentioned.

I think He wants me to quit. (It’s okay if you’re surprised.)

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

The scripture above is one of the most well-known passages in the bible. It’s a source of comfort to folks who are buried under the weight of illness, despair, and impossible expectations. But it’s even more comforting when we understand the historical context.

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As We Understood Him – Taking Step 3

In our 3rd step “We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.”

One very interesting fact of this step is that the amount or degree of our lives and will, we are able to turn over to God, will be determined by the amount or degree of our understanding of Him.

Many of our brothers and sisters came into the program as Atheists or Agnostics. In the 4th chapter of the Big Book of A.A, titled “We Agnostics” we read the following “Instead of regarding ourselves as intelligent agents, spearheads of God’s ever advancing Creation, we agnostics and atheists chose to believe that our human intelligence was the last word, the alpha and the omega, the beginning and end of all. Rather vain of us, wasn’t it? We, who have traveled this dubious path, beg you to lay aside prejudice, even against organized religion.”

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Uncondemned

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 8:1


My immediate reaction when I read this verse is, Hallelujah!!! If there’s any reason for the children of God to praise the Lord – and there are many reasons piled on top of each other – this must be it. If we were to list our blessings, as the old hymn exhorts us to do, surely the first in line would be the fact that if we’re in Christ Jesus, we are uncondemned.

Only those who understand our state outside of Christ can truly grasp what that simple phrase – no condemnation – means. Anyone who lacks a clear vision of human depravity simply doesn’t have the background to understand the fundamental importance of this verse. We must first understand, in the words of the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith, that:

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God Fights for His People

There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel. Joshua 10:14


We don’t have to attack and subdue physical cities – which in any care aren’t walled today, military technology having changed since Joshua’s day. Paul said that “the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses” 2 Cor. 10:4, and that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Eph. 6:12 We fight, we struggle, but not against physical enemies. Even when the church faces persecution from human beings, with very real guns, very real prisons, very real torturers, and very real executioners, the very real struggle isn’t against those tools of Satan, but against the spiritual wickedness which impels men to act so barbarically.

And we’re not in the fight alone. There may be no armed and armored armies beside us, and there may be no massive forces to back us up, but we’re not alone. On the contrary, the Lord fights for us.

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Simple and Pure Devotion = Nurture

Were you nurtured? Are you presently embracing nurture? Are you a nurturer? Let’s define nurture…

    …to support by way of encouragement, (as one does for another during a period of training or development) ensuring its success

    …to coach what is the fore seen in another (as with destiny, potential and promising giftedness), calling it forth to completion

    …to feed or protect one’s offspring (as a parent does for a child) until empowered to care for oneself and another


Who among us doesn’t need nurture? Who among us doesn’t fit somewhere; at any given time, in one of these definitions? Who among us has made it to maturity (in any given area of life) apart from the “nurture” of spiritual parents, mentors and/or friends? Wow! I am blessed with all three!

As the scripture says; The end of all things is near; therefore be clear minded and self-controlled so that you can pray. Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:7-8, NIV emphasis mine. These difficult “end” times call for the Body of Christ to cover each other-not expose or exploit one another’s weaknesses.

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Are You Taking Advantage of Kingdom Synergy?

Historically, no outpouring of God has lasted very long apart from intentional Kingdom Synergy. What is “synergy?” Synergy happens when two or more entities decide to join their visions for the purpose of an agreed upon outcome. They realize that doing this greatly enhances the outcome they could ever achieve alone.

Many places in the New Testament, believers were instructed to be of one mind and heart. As a matter of fact they were told to do nothing but pray together in the Upper Room until they came into oneness-‘Kingdom Synergy’.

After His death, he (Jesus) presented Himself alive to them in many different settings over a period of forty days. In face-to-face meetings, He talked to them about things concerning the Kingdom of God. As they met and ate meals together He told them they were on no account to leave Jerusalem, but must wait for what the Father promised: the promise you heard from me. John baptized in water; you will be baptized in the Holy Spirit. And soon. Acts 1:3-5, Msg.

If you can be patient with me for a moment, I’ll share a bit of “Ron’s” (loosely held) theology. My experience is my experience. I’m not saying any one has to agree with or mirror mine.

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Hold Fast !

Nevertheless what you have, hold fast until I come. Revelation 2:25


Jesus asked, “when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” Luke 18:8 Sometimes, as we look around us, we wonder if He will. There are so many – individuals, congregations, denominations – who haven’t held fast anything, but have piece by piece or wholesale given away the most precious truths in the universe, exchanging the Word of God for a bowl of weak, watery, unsatisfying something.

Jesus has called us to hold fast what we have. We don’t know everything about God’s will, His plan, His purpose, or His activity, but what we do know, we are to cling to. We have His Word – I could reach out my hand from my chair right now, and touch or pick up 15 separate copies of the Bible, plus what’s on my computer – and we are to hold fast to it. And this isn’t merely the physical printed Book. As wonderful as it is to be able to own 15 copies of the Bible (there are places in the world where a single copy, or a single book of the Bible, has to suffice for an entire congregation), it’s not enough to own them, or even read and study them. Someone who’s drowning in Bibles, yet lets what it says slip through the fingers of his mind as water slips through the fingers of his hands, might as well never have seen a Bible in his life.

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