Hi, my name is Bob. I’m not an alcoholic.
But I’m working through the 12 Steps anyway and it is changing my life.
The 12 Steps are the most-trusted method for helping people in recovery heal. The steps represent a process of honesty, confession, reconciliation, and action that has led thousands of people to face their demons.
It does not take a Bible scholar to see that the path of recovery is deeply rooted in biblical themes of sin, grace, honesty, confession, repentance, and community. The earliest followers of Jesus acknowledge their helplessness (Acts 2:37), look to God for their strength (Acts 4:12), right their wrongs (Acts 19:18-19), and gather with others who support them (Acts 2:42-47). Acts of the Apostles is the original AA. Yet churches who model themselves on those earliest Christians have lost that culture of confession and repentance. We shouldn’t be surprised that so many people in recovery wish their church was more like AA. Many church buildings host recovery meetings; few churches have the humility to enter recovery.
Churches often attract saviors and fixers looking for people to save and fix. This means we have thriving ministries of helping, but struggle to acknowledge our own hurt. We want to redeem others but struggle to identify the broken parts of ourselves. We routinely ask that God will forgive us of our sins (Matthew 6:12), but we rarely take the time to itemize them. In Steps, John Ortberg says we spend so much time trying to save face that we forget that God is trying to save our life. Hiding will prevent our healing. Augustine said, “The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”
Christians are well-acquainted with the reflexes of blaming, venting, scapegoating, and gossiping. We need to recover the biblical practice of confession. James says that confession is essential for healing (James 5:16). The next verse talks about the power of prayer for the sick. Can you imagine what a church would look like if we confessed our sins as often as we prayed for the sick? This vulnerability would not simply heal our bodies, it would heal our fractured relationships and unify our congregations. Confession might be good for the soul. But it is great for the church.
Every church needs to practice the 12 Steps. It would change lives, restore families, heal brokenness, and offer hope.
It can even be helpful for alcoholics.
