RECOVERY STEPS
SERENITY-A Companion for Twelve Step Recovery
by Dr. Robert Hemfelt and Dr. Richard Fowler

THE SERENITY PRAYER
God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.


According to this book, The catalog of addictive agents includes:

  1. Alcohol or drugs
  2. Work, achievement, and success
  3. Money addictions, such as overspending, gambliing, hoarding
  4. Control addictions, especially if they surface in personal,
    sexual, family, and business relationships
  5. Food addictions
  6. Sexual addictions
  7. Approval dependency (the need to please people)
  8. Rescuing patterns toward other persons
  9. Dependency on toxic relationships
    (relationships that are damaging and hurtful)
  10. Physical illness ( hypochondria)
  11. Exercise and physical conditioning
  12. Cosmetics, clothes, cosmetic surgery,
    tyring to look good on the outside
  13. Academic pursuits and excessive intellectualizing
  14. Religiosity or religious legalism ( preoccupation with
    the form and the rules and regulations of religion,
    rather than benefiting from the real spiritual message)
  15. General perfectionism
  16. Cleaning and avoiding contamination and other obsessive- compulsive symptoms
  17. Organizing, structuring ( the need always to have everything in its place)
  18. Materialism

Therefore, our healing must progress across several dimensions:
(a) We have to heal our human relationships....
(b) We must choose a recovery family....
(c) We need to rejoin and grow closer to God
in the spiritual family.....
HELPFUL SOLUTIONS
STEP 1
We admitted we were powerless over our dependencies-that
our lives had become unmanageable.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the
Scriptures say about admitting the unmanageability of our lives,
see: Matthew 9:36, Romans 7:18-20, Psalm 6:2-4, Psalm 31:9,10,
Psalm 38:1-9, Psalm 44:15,16, Psalm 72:12,13
STEP 2
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. Recovery Meditations To help you understand what the Scriptures say about
God's power to restore us to wholeness,
see:Matthew 12:18-21, Mark 9:23,24, Luke 13:10-13,
John 6:63, John 12:46, Psalm 18:1-3, Psalm 142
STEP 3
Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over
to the care of God as we understood Him.Recovery
meditations To help you understand what the Scriptures
say about surrendering your will and life to God,
see:Matthew 11:28-30, Matthew 16:21-26, Ephesians 2:8,9,
Psalm 3:5,6 Psalm 23, Psalm 91:1-4, Proverbs 3:5,6
STEP 4
Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say
about the personal inventorying of our lives
see:Matthew 23:23-28, Luke 12:1-6, Romans 13:11-14,
1 Corinthians 4:19,20, Galatians 6:3-5, Proverbs 5:3-6, Proverbs 16:2,3 STEP 5
Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about confession's role in our recovery,
see:Luke 15:17-20, Acts 19:18, 2 Corinthians 10:3-5, Hebrews 4:12-16, James 5:16, 1 John 1:8,9, Proverbs 28:13,14
STEP 6
Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about willingness
to yield our character defects to God
see:Romans 6:11,12, Ephesians 4:17-23, Colossians 3:5-8, 1 Peter 1:13-16,
1 John 4:18, Revelation 3:19,20, Psalm 119:28-40
STEP 7
Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what
the Scriputres say about the importance of asking God to remove our shortcomigs,
see:Matthew 18:4, Acts 3:19, Hebrews 12:5-11, 1 Peter 5:6,7, 1 John 5:14,15, Psalm 21:6-8,
Psalm 37:23,24
STEP 8
Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about the importance of our
willingness to make amends to the people we have harmed
see: Matthew 18:21-35, Luke 6:37,38, Luke 19:8, John 13:34,35,
1 Corinthians 13, 2 Timothy 1:7, James 4:11,12
STEP 9
Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about how to reconcile with people we have harmed,
see: Matthew 5:9, Romans 15:2, Philippians 1:9-11, Colossians 4:5,6, Philemon 8-17, Psalm 51:14-17, Proverbs 16:20-24.
STEP 10
Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about the
need for an ongoing inventory of our lives,
see:Mark 14:38, Romans 12:3, 1 Thessalonians 5:17-22, Hebrews 2:1-3, 1 Peter 2:11, Psalm 85:8,9, Psalm 103:8-18
STEP 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.
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about the value of prayer and meditation
in seeking God's will and power for our lives,
see :John 4:13,14, Romans 8:26-28, Galatians 2:20, Philippians 4:6-9, Titus 3:1-7, Psalm 84:5-12,Psalm127:1,2
STEP 12
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to others,
and to practice these principles in all our affairs
Recovery Meditations to help you understand what the Scriptures say about sharing our spiritual awakening with others through message and example,
see: Mark 5:18-20, 1Corinthians 9:22-27, 1 Corinthians 15:10, 1 Timothy 1:12-16, Psalm 92:1-4, Psalm 96:1,2, Proverbs 31:26-31
ADDITIONAL HELP

Where to Go for Additional Help Alcoholics Anonymous POB 459 Grand Central Station New York, NY 10163 (212) 686-1100 Overcomers Outreach 2290 W. Whittier Blvd. Suite d La Habra, CA 90631 (213) 697-3994 (Alcoholics and Adult Children Claiming Christ's Promises and Accepting His healing) Adult Children of Alcoholics, Central Service Board POB 35623

Los Angeles, CA 90035 (213) 464-4423 National Clearinghouse for Alcohol Information POB 1908 Rockville, MD 20850 Gamblers Anonymous POB 17173 Los Angeles, CA 90017 (213)386-8789 Al-Anon/Alateen Family Group Headquarters, Inc. POB 182

Madison Square Station New York, NY 10159 1-800-356-9996 (212) 302-7240 Debtors Anonymous 314 W. 53rd St. New York, NY 10019 (2120 969-0710 Incest Survivors Anonymous POB 5613 Long Beach, CA 90800 Narcotics Anonymous World Service Office 16155 Wyandotte St. Van Nuys, CA 91406 9818) 780-3951 National Association for Children of Alcoholics 31582 Coast Highway Suite B South Laguna, CA 92677 (714) 499-3889 Emotions Anonymous POB 4245 St. Paul, MN 55104 (612) 647-9712 (international) (612) 738-9099 ( Twin Cities) Overeaters Anonymous World Service Office 2190 190th St. Torrance, CA 90504 (213) 542-8363

http://freenet.buffalo.edu/~bg267/friends.htm

Let us not forget our missing children, they are victims of abuse also. This is my prayer to them:


Dear Heavenly Father, We ask you to please take care of our missing and exploited children, Your children dear God. That through no fault of their own they have fallen victim to abuse, some to neglect. We ask dear Lord that you return them safely to their homes. We ask Lord that their parents and or guardians will have the strength to bear the situation. That they will have the faith to trust in you, that they will pray also that it will be YOUR will for their children to be found. Father God, please send your angels to protect and guard them. And Father God Almighty, in Jesus' name we ask that the one's responsible for these actions will come to their senses and rebuke the devil, because Lord, we know that this is nothing but an evil act of the adversary, which he is only capable of. All these requests we present them to YOU in Jesus Christ's most precious name.

AMEN








THE    BUTTERFLY

THE BUTTERFLY The Butterfly is representative of the freedom one has. The ugly caterpillar was once bond and wrapped in a cocoon. We were once bound by sin. As the butterfly emerges free to soar to loftly heights- so many we be free to soar to higher heights in Christ Jesus. As the butterfly is many colors-so are we many denominations. From caterpillar to butterfly- "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away, and behold, all things are become new" Corinthians 5:17)Free Women In Christ Inc.
120-02 Marsden St.
Jamaica, NY 11433
(718) 276-5039 To develop a road to Christian maturity by studying major scriptural principals and applying them to our daily walk. To look beyond ourselves and reach out to other women.
Are you often depressed, lonely, can't cope, need a friend? Frustrated, can't express yourself? Would you like to meet other women to talk with to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to know more about Him, to pray with? If you want salvation, transformation and liberation, we invite you to become a F.W.I.C.
MILICENT JAMES NORTON - International President
(718)291-2592
REV. GLENNIE THOMPSON- President
Howe Farm
4 Timothy Dell
Hampton, VA 23669
(757) 850-3108
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