Chapter 4 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous states, "...we had to fearlessly face the proposition that God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is, or He isn't. What was our choice to be?" When I came to the very point in my recovery where I had no desire to turn back to my old life but letting go of my nature was viciously frightening this question laid uncomfortably unanswered before me. Prior to this juncture in my journeys I may have answered affirmatively yet it wasn't until that precise moment in which I fully understood what was being asked of me - or rather, what was required of me to move onward and upward.
If any of us are to recover from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body we must: be free of manifesting our human defects in our behavior; live a life in which we exude tolerance and love of all; never be accepting of evil; live free from fear, anxiety and anger; be open to respect and love; posses the spirits of charity, forgiveness and joy. We must answer the question without heed to our human intellect - our nature telling us what we ought to do because we think we need to - but by opening ourselves to the presence of God and what he has planned. Joy is, indeed, the actual presence of God. Joy is no longer the absence of sorrow but His love laying constantly restive on our hearts.
When I answered, "God is everything" I, for the first time in my entire life, had become fully alive. The Spirit was awakened within me. It was in my heart and my soul, it drove through my mind with grace and swirled through my conscious like a cleansing river. I became and I am the human being that God created me to be, maximizing my human potential, free of conflict, and at peace.
I was and I am aware of what is required of me and I have answered, "Yes, God is everything." What will your answer be?
Written by Armand
Edited by Caitlin Alexandra
Half measures availed me nothing, emptiness still pervaded, relationships remained fully unformed, recovery meant not drinking and going in order to meetings to self-affirm that I was "in the program." It took almost sixty years of my life to find the problem corroding my life even while it may have looked good to the outside world: I was spiritually blocked!How I got that way is irrelevant. How to become spiritually unblocked was the Gift of my life. I was blessed with a sponsor who'd "been there and had done that." He took me through every word of The Big Book, heard my Fifth Step, guided me to the realm of the spirit, and enabled The Power Within me to be awakened. The Twelve Steps led me to me and to The Power Within me. So is that everything? That is everything! Loves, hopes, dreams, relationships. Everything.
ReplyDeleteMichael An awakened spirit in a recovered alcoholic is a Divine force. The Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, if integrated, leads an alcoholic to a conscious contact with God - an awareness of the presence of God in this moment. There alcoholics and addicts live in freedom and in peace. Welcome all to the world of the Spirit...Thank you/...Armand
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