Working through addiction is a long journey. The adage says “no one said it would be easy“, and no one gave timeframe to be recovered. In our spiritual life, no one also stated we need to do everything within a particular time period. Nevertheless, church have, in the past, demanded that we change, repent and ‘become saved’ – whatever that exactly means – at a specific gathering, meeting, or ‘altar call’. Why did they do this?
Steps 10 & 11
On our journey through the 12 steps we now encounter steps 10-11.
•(10) Continued to take personal inventory and, when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
•(11) Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him(*), praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
*Him was used in the 12 Steps guide, but God’s gender is not defined. On many occasions the gender of God is in fact feminine (El Shaddai, even Ruach), our culture has seemingly deemed that God is masculine.
That first word, continue, is key. For the one in recovery, the journey is possibly perceived as a perpetual one. For those not in formal recovery, can we understand that : that being in recovery is one that will go on and on?
Once we have started to make direct amends for the issues we have discovered in our life, we return to this each and every day. Once the mist starts to clear, we may be able to see with greater clarity.
“We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!”
1 Cor 13:12 The Message
This isn’t going to be an overnight sensation. This is going to require some work from us. ‘Personal Inventory’ also suggests a thorough review of our lives, not a scant check based upon a comparison with our friends, or the neighbour etc. Our lives are ours – who compare with others?
Then we asked, in Step 11, ‘through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God’. Do we need to sign up for a long retreat in a monastery? I’m sure that is possible, a lot of Ignatian spirituality has a deep sincere focus upon such a life; however, if we are doing the personal inventory every day, then this prayer and meditation is one we do each and every day. But hang on, are we to carve out chunks of the day to prayer and say ‘omm’? I don’t think so, but it might benefit some folks.
It is possibly looking for God throughout our life, intentionally allowing our attention to scan for God wherever we are. I think of it as a kin to a radar, sweeping, scanning ahead of the aircraft. For a fair proportion of the time it scans, but occasionally we get a glimpse of potential activity. As we tune the sensors more to what we need to see, we can detect it far easier.
Then ‘praying only for knowledge of his will for us’. Not praying for money to arrive, for our success to blossom, for a car parking space to exist as we turn the next corner. “God is not a cosmic slot machine“, paraphrasing Nadia Bolz-Weber, comes to mind. Here’s a link to the short session on ‘Why doesn’t God answer prayers‘.
Psalm 27
“The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked advance against me to devour me, it is my enemies and my foes who will stumble and fall. Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear, though war break out against me, even then I will be confident. One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple. For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling; he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent and set me high upon a rock. Then my head will be exalted above the enemies who surround me.”
Psalm 27: 1-6
- So, given this passage, does this give us courage to tackle steps 10 and 11?
- If so, does it resolve the issue once and for all, here and now?
- If I can accept that first statement “The Lord is my light and salvation”, can I move on immediately to whatever step 12 has in store?
Our Christian life
I wonder how you might describe your Christian life. Has it been plain sailing or a bit jagged like shown to the right? Never a straight path but one with a myriad of encounters, some harsher than others – where even the Cross appears a little indistinct.
Do we have a multitude of questions which we would like to ask, but are too afraid to pop the question? I wonder whether those things that we learnt in Sunday School have had time to brush off the dust which might have gathered there, for some re-examination to occur. Surely, life and circumstances might allow us that opportunity to ask more questions?
What questions might you have about Christianity, the faith our church holds, which you would like to ask? That’s part of our personal inventory.
Conclusion
Is having a personal inventory negative? Just imagine doing a spring clean and finding that long lost object, something which you recall gave such happy memories. Could we imagine it to be a positive cathartic experience?
How, then, might we view prayer after this: one in which we can listen to God, scanning for God in our life?
I am enjoying the dialogue