Friday, October 22, 2010

Encouragement

My sponsor and leader of step study wrote this for me. As our step study ended every women wrote affirmations for each other and I hate I missed the last meeting where it was all shared. This is what my sponsor wrote to me and it meant so much.(side note, I got into step study bc of alcoholism and my marriage blew up two months into step study)

"My friend, no one could have imagined what God was going to require of you in this past year. I think in His infinite wisdom, He decided to yank off your old self like a band aid, the pain very intense but exposing the wound to air and light so that healing could begin. You faced the pain, sometimes kicking and screaming and sometimes with trust, but you never backed away from it. I have watched as you took off the dirty clothes that either others have put on you or you had put on yourself and replaced them with His righteousness. Slowly learning to accept yourself the way He sees you and loving others beyond capacity...."

I love this women for so many different reasons. She has challenged me in ways no one else could have and with such grace and wisdom. Many times I left angry at the Truth she was speaking and wondering if I could really walk through this and continue on. Her love and never backing down when I was really, really angry at times has in turn given me up most respect for her. God knew I needed her to hold my hand, love on me, and show me when I was wrong! Again a testament to His grace and faithfulness.

In a rut

So I have been in a rut the past two weeks. Writing about it is therapeutic to me so here we go... I have lived in angst and have been down right crazy. Old behavior and thought patterns popping up everywhere, TONS of self-pity and laziness. It has been very discouraging to feel and watch yourself spiral downward. After two weeks of living in this manner, I decided to dive back into heavy recovery.
I went to a meeting last night for 30 minutes, it was all the time I had, but while there a peace pulsed through me which I hadn't been able to find in a while. Today I went to a Jafi meeting, one downtown, and let me just tell you I thought I might have a panic attack, almost left until the meeting started and people started sharing. Jafi is a very diverse meeting. For one hour the mighty descend and the lowly rise. People coming from their 6 figure jobs in three piece suits and sitting next to those who are next to homeless with no teeth and laughing and joking. It is a holy place, it grieves my heart deeply that I don't experience this kind of atmosphere in church, no doubt in my mind this is what heaven will be. For one hour people spill their guts and the man in the three piece suit and the man with no teeth have something in common. They have come to a broken place, a shattered life that most are slowly trying to rebuild. There is no pride, no judgement, nothing but people sharing over and over the miracles they have experienced through sobriety. There are ex-cons there, people diagnosed with HIV, people who have lost everything and moms like me who haven't lost a material thing, but their self. It is truly amazing. For one hour I get out of myself and connect to people in ways I can't explain. At the end we all hold hands and say the Lord's prayer, and that alone brings tears to my eyes almost every time.
It is a gift. A gift from God to be able to go and experience a roomful of miracles that share a common purpose and hope. Do I want to drink again? No, but if I stopped going to meetings and experienced the angst like I have the past two weeks I am pretty sure I would choose to drink again, if anything to escape myself. It is a relief and like medicine for the soul. When I am willing and open to go to these meetings and seek God's will and help for my life he blesses me in ways I cannot begin to explain. Tonight I am joyful, productive, and enjoying my family and I could not have said that at 5 pm. That, my friend, proves God's faithfulness and grace and something I could not have done on my own.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Some thoughts...

The past year God has blessed us with a handful of couples to walk beside us in the journey of healing and walking towards Jesus. They are our small group. From letters to gifts, to phone calls, cakes and flowers, and most importantly prayer and encouragement they have preached the gospel to us as individuals and a couple. They are such a blessing and testament to living out the gospel in allowing us to hurt, cry, laugh, live authentically and always, always encouraging us to follow Him.
We have started a new book this season called "Intimate Allies" by Dan Allender and so far it is great. We are only in the first couple of chapters, but our discussion the other night was on disappointment in your spouse and living in hope. Living in disappointment is wrong and idolizing your spouse is wrong. Neither are living out of the gospel. Lately, I have been dealing with this and God has been showing me new things daily. There is no doubt this book has come at such a time like this.

I have started realizing my thoughts in degrading my husband in my mind, shaming him to myself and this becomes my reality in which I act out of. In acknowledging this several weeks ago, I begin to realize actually how often I did it and how I was living in disappointment, acknowledging it is healthy, staying in that place isn't. God revealed to me that I needed to pray for whatever I was disappointed or angry in. For example... wisdom. I wish he would make wiser decisions for us as a family, so I begin to pray the Lord would give him wisdom. After talking to my sponsor today she recommended taking it a step further and asking God to give me spiritual eyes in seeing where he has progressed and where he had made wise choices. Immediately I was able to rattle off some things that came to mind, where before my vision had become so blurred with what he wasn't doing that had become my reality and I had actually missed some of the wise choices he had made.

P.S. As I was finishing this my husband came in (not knowing what I was typing) and prayed with me and it.was.beautiful. and a very wise prayer. The verse while he was praying that came to mind was "Seek and ye shall find, knock and the door will be opened to you..."I feel like that is happening all around me...everyday.