The New Year

What will I bring to the New Year?  God will be sure to bring me many opportunities, as long as I am spiritually fit... Therefore I must take the prescribed actions everyday... Steps 10, 11 and 12...

We have lost so many this year to this disease... Will I do my part in 2014?  "Near you alcoholics are dying helplessly like people in a sinking ship" (BB pg 153)  Will I be in the trench or resting on my laurels?  Why has God poured His Grace upon me?  Will I carry this message?  Will you?

As I look forward to the New Year I think the most fitting thing I can do today is to say this prayer, and to repeat it each and everyday, until it becomes part of my innermost being, part of my everyday actions... May I depend on God to make those changes, may I seek His will each and everyday...

Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me bring love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.


O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be comforted as to comfort;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen

 

God bless each and everyone of you today and all through the New Year...

Love

The drunk sipping out of his bottle behind the store, the homeless woman on the street corner, the hungry children in a run down apartment parking lot, the addict detoxing in the jail cell, the wife at home, worrying herself to death over her wandering mate, the businessman with all of the material things, dying on the inside because he cannot stop drinking, the inmate in the prison, anguishing over his children, his hopeless children feeling abandoned by their father, the crack head with the burning lips, the junkie with the tore up arms... 

What will I do to bring comfort to these at Christmas, and the rest of the year as well?  Am I so wrapped up in my things, my family, my little plans and designs that I have no time for them? After all God has given me, will I turn and give to another...

Alcoholics and addicts are dying needlessly around us by the thousands while we live our selfish and self-centered lives.  If each of us would only try to help one person, man or woman, parent or child, what a difference could be made...  In some small way, with some bit of kindness, God could change our own little piece of the world.

Helping one another in Love... This is what Christmas and every other day of the year is about...

If we give we will find... If we help we will be helped... If we love we will be loved...  We were created to be dependent on the Creator.  If we ask Him in our morning meditation He will show us what to do... If we ask Him how we can help, He will give us the opportunity to be of service...

This is how we grow, this is how we learn, this is how we demonstrate God's Power. 

Ladies and gentlemen, this is how we roll...

God bless you all,

Acting

Acting my way into a conscious awareness of the presence of my Creator seemed to me at first to be not only hypocritical, but also about the stupidest thing I had ever heard.  But I had no choice.  I was beaten down by alcohol, my options were all gone.  I did not have a plan left.

I had been through the first step.  I knew I had no control, no choice, and no power.  All I had was this old recovered alcoholic telling me to get on my knees and do the 3rd step prayer with him.  I didn't want to, I didn't believe it would work, I sure didn't feel like doing it.

But I did it anyway, it felt like it didn't change a thing, I didn't believe anything was different.  He told me to do it every morning, on my knees.  I thought it was stupid and I told him so.  He told me pray it to the wall, just do it.  I did...

I also took other actions he told me to take, inventories, lists, amends and the like.  Something happened in the midst of doing all those things I didn't want to do.  I became aware that the obsession to drink and use was gone... And I became aware of something else, the conscious presence of my Creator...

By simply taking actions I didn't want to take, my life has been changed completely and forever.  Not because I am special, but because God is...

So if you don't feel joyful and thankful this season, then try acting joyful and thankful and you will be soon enough...

If your fears and worries are crowding peace and serenity out of your life.  Then just act like your God is big enough to handle anything. He is...

All we really need, is to heed spark of that spark of the Divine which is in each and everyone of us, for it to burst into a flame which will keep you warm and fulfilled, in the midst of the wildest storm. More importantly it will spread to the people you seek to help and heal them as well...

This is my hope and prayer for all of you, my friends, in this Christmas season, that you humble yourself before your Creator and acknowledge that without Him you are nothing... That simple act of humility will give Him room to work in your heart and mind and accomplish for you what you cannot do for yourself...

I leave you with the prayer...

"God, I offer myself to the to build with me and do with me as Thou wilt.  Relieve me of the bondage of self , that I may better do Thy will.  Take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life.  May I do Thy will always!"

Peace and Grace...

Attitude

During these short gray cold winter days many of us start to hibernate.  For people of our type this is not always a good thing.... Why go that meeting, its cold and I am tired?  I have a cold and don't feel like talking to this guy...  Its all about my attitude... I was talking to my sponsor yesterday and we were talking about the camaraderie in some of our meetings with it freezing outside and the coffee pot going and everyone joined in one place for one purpose...  Today, I go out amongst my people and share my hope and am always the better for it...

I was taught a new definition of attitude... It is "angle of approach"... How am I approaching my fellows, with a smile or with a sour frown? How am I approaching my Creator, with joy and thankfulness or with self interest and self pity.

This disease doesn't take a day off.  And I can't afford to, and besides it is no fun being wrapped up in my own brain anyway...

I am grateful today. So I need to go and show it.  Slap a smile on and go help God's kids for free and for fun...