During my early years of Twelve Step recovery, a wise and
wonderful sponsor listened patiently to my frustration over a recurring problem
which I thought I had already turned over to God. She reassured me that, yes,
we had talked about this issue before and, yes, I had indeed already
surrendered the matter… several times, in fact.
Then she would say, “But now God is calling you to surrender
at a deeper level.”
In the years since I benefited from this woman’s counsel, I
have repeatedly relinquished certain parts of my life, principally the more
resilient negative aspects of my personality. More recently I have yielded
attitudes, behaviors, even personal goals, as they reveal themselves as
impediments to my spiritual growth.
While none of my personal surrenders has been easy or
comfortable, this process has taught me that only an insistent willingness to
seek better insight into myself, a desire to live in greater faithfulness to
God and a wish to achieve more effectiveness in the world can ensure my
continuing recovery and development in faith.
Over the years I have heard many Twelve Steppers confess
that they fear a return to their addictions, not because they dread dying –
death would be a welcome relief for some in the depths of their diseases! – but
because they can’t bear the thought of living again in such appalling
conditions or of inflicting on their loved ones the acute pain they know their
addictions can cause. Such fears serve a useful purpose. They keep individuals
alert to signs that warn of an impending slip, cautioning them against taking
recovery for granted.
Recently two of my friends spent time in treatment centers,
fighting to regain recovery from reactivated addictions. I was once again reminded
of the astonishing resilience of the human being – in body, mind and spirit. No
logic can account for the survival of some individuals. One must simply
acknowledge that a far superior reality is at work, that women and men who
endure against incredible odds must have something more to accomplish in their
tasks on earth.
All of those who struggle with recovery serve as caution
lights for other Twelve Steppers. At times we may tell ourselves that we are
progressing smartly in our lives. We may even believe that there couldn’t
possibly be anything else we need to turn over to God. But in a spiritually
guided life, there always seems to be one more issue, something old or
something new, that requires attention.
We may be called to abandon our insistence on managing the
circumstances of our lives – the people with whom we will be in relationship,
the state of our health, the well-being of those we love, the progress of our
careers, our financial condition or where and how God is calling us to serve.
Deeper surrenders often involve multiple addictions,
distressingly common among persons in recovery. As one problem is conquered,
the underlying addictive nature may emerge in another, unforeseen way.
Sometimes the seemingly new problem was present all along, masked by the more
glaring addiction which caused the most devastation. Eventually addicts must
address multiple addictions or risk relapse in all areas.
I once attended Twelve Step meetings with a man who referred
to his prayers as “shouting at the Sheetrock.” We always chuckled, but the
image exposed his nagging suspicion that maybe his prayers didn’t really travel
far at all. I have never seriously believed that prayers can be curbed by
material restraints, but I do think this man was onto something with the
shouting part.
At a week-long retreat I attended this year, led by a lovely
nun who has spent years studying, sharing and praying the words of the Psalms,
we examined the Psalms in their historical context. We read them as poetry. We
considered them as an element in church liturgy. Working our way through
expressions of praise and thanksgiving, joy and mourning, fear and bravado, we
encountered every sentiment ever experienced by humankind.
Our culture, the gentle sister said, needs to reclaim the
art of lament. We need to free ourselves to cry out, to acknowledge the pain of
our lives and the anguish in the world around us.
Sometimes I wish I knew Hebrew and the original musical
notations for the Psalms so I could sing them as they were meant to be sung, holding
back nothing, crying out our dissatisfaction, bewailing our afflictions.
Of course, each of us could write our own book of psalms. An
elderly woman, after thanking me for speaking to the ladies group at her
church, stated this truism: “Everyone has
a story.” Any one of us beyond the age of innocence could write our stories and
sing our songs – perhaps gnashing our teeth, shouting at the Sheetrock, howling
in sorrow at the moon.
As humans we are so incapable of ordering our lives and
remedying our suffering that we may err in projecting these same inadequacies
upon God. But through deepening surrender, through total release of
self-determination, through a genuine cry for God’s all-powerful help, we can
embrace the loving support that is greater, more dependable, more lasting than
anything we can imagine.
There is simply no despair too dark, no pain too great, no
trouble too deep for the grace of God.
(This excerpt is reprinted by author permission: From the Crucible: When Recovery and Religion
Merge by Constance Bovier, Xulon Press, available from www.amazon.com
and other booksellers.)