I recently listened to your message entitled "Overcoming Shame". I believe that it is one of the most helpful messages that I have heard since I became a Christian 35 years ago. thanks so very much.

JAMES IRBY :: September 5, 2006 04:27 PM

I recently listened to your message entitled "Overcoming Shame". I believe that it is one of the most helpful messages that I have heard since I became a Christian 35 years ago. thanks so very much.

JAMES IRBY :: September 5, 2006 04:27 PM

I recently heard your message "Overcoming Shame". I was greatly helped by this message. thanks so very much.

james irby :: September 5, 2006 04:34 PM

In one of the parables, someone was found to be without a wedding garment. He was removed from the wedding. I believe that the garment represents repentance. This is the necessary thing that AA does right. Repentance keeps us honest by confessing our sin so that we can defeat sin. It is when we deny or hide our sin that trouble ocurrs.

Rob Webster :: October 26, 2006 06:22 AM

We have actually re-structured our church emphasis to more relational and accountability settings because of what individuals shared about AA meetings. So far it has been excellent. We just don't allow our problems or sins to be identity, but Jesus is. Example: "My name is .......... and I'm an alcolholic." We don't buy in to that stuff. Blessings to all.

Randy :: February 1, 2007 08:00 PM

I agree with your statement. I have found more unconditional love in AA than I have in most churches. And if someone slips, they aren't judged and condemned by their fellows. The church could learn a lot from Alcoholics Anonymous on love.

Chuckles :: February 23, 2007 12:46 AM

I'm glad someone else thinks this way. I've been going to Al-Anon (which is AA for people that don't have a drinking problem but have a relationship with someone who does) at first I thought I was too good for them because I had the real answers in Jesus.

As I continued to go to meetings I realized I was the one that was messed up. People were sharing their hearts in a way that I could never do. They were REAL and they honestly discussed their issues of life with genuine hope and wisdom.

I finally started to tell people that Al-Anon/AA actually functions better than church does because people let down their guards, they can be honest. Too many of us in the church are putting up a front and can't let that honesty show through.

The difference between Al-Anon/AA and the church is that the people who come into the meetings are already broken and know they need help, Alcohol is what brings them there and keeps them there. I think most people in the church don't even know why they're there, there's not a sense of brokeness in the church as there is in the AA meetings.

For them the focus is alcohol, but for us, the church, there isn't a really defined focus as to what brought us there. It should be that we were rescued from death and brought into life through Jesus.

I'm so glad to see that you have a website, you're book literally changed my life and is the catalyst for where I am today. I've written about it here: http://www.howtobecomeamissionary.com/in-the-beginning/

Thank you so much for what you've done. Looking forward to what's next!

Paul Ferree

Paul Ferree :: April 30, 2007 07:09 PM

I agree that the church could learn "some" things from AA. But acceptance and forgiveness is still conditional at AA. For those who think AA is more forgiving than the church, try being a severe alcoholic with chronic relapse history and see how well you're reached out to. Sure they clap for you, and you get smiles, but you get fewer and fewer supporting and encouraging words. Eventually you're tolerated, but kept at an emotional distance as one with something wrong with him - alcoholic leprosy, maybe. The church is still the only place where I have found unconditional love. At AA I expect people to accept and love me for they have the same sickness, it's no big deal. But in the church I have found people who accept, love, and regard me as equal because they have their own weaknesses, which, even though not alcohol, are just as enslaving. It's not the church that says "just keep your mouth shut until you have a year of sobriety." Six years of active involvement in AA proved to me that AA people are just as judgmental toward "religious" people as they accuse religious people of being toward them. The church could learn from their openness and seriousness toward the issues that can destroy life. But AA could learn much from the church regarding living the life instead of spouting cliche's, about repentance, and about resistance to temptation, a concept which is not even mentioned in AA. I'm still looking for a men's group with some of the strengths I saw in the AA rooms; but I have long since stopped looking for the presence of the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ in the rooms. I will take a judgmental atmosphere where Christ and true deliverance by the cross is present anyday over the "any higher power will do" philosophy that drives AA of today. Your best bet if you're an alcoholic Christian is to learn what you can from the rooms, stay in the word and develop your own plan, faithfully go through it each day, and get a pastor you can confide in and who will answer his phone instead of going to the answer machine you get from the average AA person. Sorry, I know that's blunt, but I want your deliverance, and that won't be found by those who merely talk about God, but from those who experience Him.

Bill :: December 3, 2007 05:42 AM

I urge you to check out Celebrate Recovery. It is a nationwide ministry that was birthed out of Saddleback Church in California. John Baker, a member of Saddleback and a recovering alcoholic, felt God's calling for a christian 12 step program.

Kelly Karl :: June 6, 2008 12:02 AM