Should We Go Easy On the God Stuff?

[admin]

Should We Go Easy On the God Stuff?

http://www.aagrapevine.org/da/browsedept.php?da=d%3A30&pg=41

[JohnDaniels]

I appreciated reading the above post about "Should we go easy on the God Stuff?"

Although many people can agree how much they love God, those same people will become easily intolerant of others personal beliefs about God. It as though I have heard this message from many as if they were saying, "I love God, but I hate you." That's pretty extreme but it does happen. I think it happens more outside of AA than it happens inside of AA.

I've been at meetings where the topic of discussion was a Higher Power. It usually goes over quite well and many come away from a meeting like that feeling better than they did before they went.

On occasion someone will go into detail about their religeon and it will offend someone else in the group. At one meeting I attend, a man brings with him a whip about two feet in length with a handle and several leather strips attached to the handle. He will whip himself over the back repeatedly at times. I certainly don't care one way or the other if he does this. He's of legal age and is not hurting any of us. If he started whipping others at meetings I am sure I would have a great deal to say to him about it. But as far as him giving himself lashes over his own back, that's his business and none of mine. The others always have a real hard time with him though. I have seen that man and others almost come to blows in the parkinglot after meetings where we just finished discussing our Higher Powers. Sometimes it saddens me and other times I just have to shake my head and accept that as one of the things in life that I cannot change. That man whipping himself doesn't even want it to be changed anyway. More power to him.

I have never personally tried whipping myself over the back that way. I would imagine it would hurt. Now that I think about it, I saw a movie scene from "The Da Vinci Code" where a man whipped himself over the back the same way. At this point I have no desire to even try it. I don't like pain. In fact when I drank, many times it was to ease my pain. So to consciencely self inflict pain is not something I care to do. I already have chronic pain and that is enough of a load.

I often think a good topic of discussion would be "Higher Power and Tolerance" or "Higher Power and Acceptance".

That first meeting we all attended is such an imporant part of our foundation for our continued sobriety. We all talk about our first meeting we attended when we tell our stories.

I am so glad that my first meeting was nothing like some of this stuff I see at meetings now days. The first meeting I attended was perfect for me. It was led by oldsters of the first generation of AA members. My original sponsor, may he rest in peace, got his message in Chicago from Bill W. in the beginning. My original sponsor was able to take that message back out west and start the first AA meeting in the north-western United States.

Those meetings had their own personallity unlike anything I go to today. It was when we would tell in a "general way, what we used to be like, what happened and what we were like today". It was in a general way and was not that way to specifically coddle the newcomers feelings, even thought the newcomer was so vitally important. It was in a "general way" because that was what our instructions were.

After meetings I had some of the most spiritual experiences of my life setting with my sponsor in his basement. At one point he and I knealt down and prayed for God to guide both of us as we took that journey inward with him sponsoring me. It worked even though our religeous upbringings were as conflicting as they come. We were not praying on a basis of any religeon, we were praying from our hearts on the basis of spirituality.

We would never have even thought of doing that in a meeting though. Not that we were ashamed by it, it was just that our instructions were to keep it simple at meetings and remember our primary purpose which is to carry the message to the alcoholic who still suffers.

I know though, many times especially in the beginning we hurt so bad and are in such an emotional pain that we cann't help but to spill over in an AA meeting about how much pain we are suffering. That is the point of how important good sponsorship is because I too suffered in so much pain. I wanted to talk about it in meetings. And often I did. I soon learned to confide certain things in my sponsor.

Good sponsorship in my opinion does not include being a financial advisor, a plummer, or a marriage counselor. To me it means being there 24-7 for the sponcee to help him work through the initial cravings. It means to be there to help the sponcee start with Step 1 and learn how to apply all of the 12 Steps to our everyday living. I have found that the problems of finances and romances will eventually clear up when we start applying the 12 Steps to our lives a day at a time. When we sober up we all have plumming that needs repairing and in time, the 12 Steps will teach us enough common sense to handle life's challenges in a responsible way.

I better wrap this up because it is getting quite long now. I do have a good life today that when I look back to my early days of sobriety, I have to wonder just how did I get where I am today. I am just not smart enough to have gotten here by way of self knowledge. I have been at a stage in my sobriety for the past several years where I can clearly see that God is doing for me what I can not do for myself.

[anniemac]

Wonderful Grapevine article; thanks for posting it, Tammy!

I walked in to these rooms a lifelong devout atheist. If I had heard all about God at my first meeting I would have certainly bolted. Granted, a spiritual organization has every right to talk about spirituality and it would have been my problem if I didn't like it; yet when that organization's primary purpose is to help other alcoholics, then, well, why scare some of them off right away?

By the gentle encouragement I received from my sponsor and others in the fellowship, I came to believe in a power greater than myself, and now life a faith-based life. That's in part because nothing was crammed down my throat from the start.

[kaistevens]

What I have come to believe is ...
All Higher Powers lead to God (or whatever you call him).

Just like 'A rose, by any other name, is still a rose."

My father was a pastor. He seemed to think it was his job to define God. So many times, my parents would sign God's name to their own Bull Spit. Their opinions, were God's laws. So, needless to say, when I got here, that little three letter word conjured up some very negative ideas, beliefs, impressions, conceptions. So, I prayed to and spoke about a Higher Power, and often times still do.

I am still careful about saying 'God' too much. For me, when people said to me 'Higher Power', the only definition for it was, 'a power, greater than (higher than) me'. I didn't have to sift through other people's opinions, interpretations, or concepts.

Words are just sounds (or letters) bundled together to communicate ideas. We assign our ideas to words so that we can convey them to one another. The reason 'a picture is worth a thousand words' is because there is more than one way to express any idea, or to see something.

So, when I talk about my recovery, I stick very close to...
"What worked for me... "
"What I had to do... "
"I came to believe... "
And when I don't know, I just say
"I don't know..."

Today, my Higher Power is larger than I can comprehend. God, of my understanding, has no limitations and is bigger than I can define, so I don't guess or try to fill in the blanks. I am careful in talking about God, but I never hesitate to mention spirituality. It's not God's fault he has been so mis-represented, but human beings have a tendancy to get trapped in words, and God knows who he is, and he knows my heart when I come to him, and that is all that matters.

I believe that there is only ONE source; up there, or out there, or in there;
and he, or she, or it, is the only ONE who can accurately be credited for the existance of me, or you, or anything that is;
and in looking around at everything that is, and I see a lot of intricate attention to details;
which says to me (a power lesser than he, or she, or it), that a lot of care was taken in the design and creation of even the smallest, most seemingly insignificant things;

But that gets a little wordee, so I will just call him God. And let go of my old ideas. And let you call him whatever works for you. And I am confident that he is big enough to be all those things and much more.

It was the "as we understand him" part that saved my *ss. Cause the God I understood as a child was only going to love, or even help, me when I stopped smoking, stopped drinking, stopped cursing, stopped driving over the speed limit, ...........

Yes, I am careful about the way I go about talking about God. Not because of anything about God, but because the unhealthy conceptions that we, as human beings, have picked up from an imperfect world, could get in the way of my reaching someone who is in need of what that Higher Power has for them.