Partners in Hope

Control is a relationship problem which is common in addiction. Control issues in a person’s life may result from traumatic or abusive life experiences. Controlling people want life to be the way they see it rather than the way it is.

Learning how to communicate well is an essential part of this new life with God in recovery that we are now living.

God wants us to have a rich and satisfying life. The evil one seeks to harm and destroy us as effectively as he can. Living free from sexual sin is a wonderful way to enter the life of dignity, respect, and blessing that God has prepared for us.

After we work hard and make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves, as if that weren’t hard enough, then  Step Five requires that “We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.” I mean, if we are being honest, in who of us doesn’t that set our heart quaking a bit? Where can we find courage and comfort to do this?

Step 4 rather abruptly, it seems to most of us, turns a fierce searchlight on all that has gone on in our lives.  It’s no wonder some folks flee at this point.  I mean, if we are being honest, even those who’ve not gone down the trail of active addiction, who of us are anxious to expose all the ways we’ve gone wrong?  But that’s both the challenge and the invitation of Step 4 as we make this journey from brokenness to healing.

From feeling hopeless and then moving to a place of being hopeful in Steps 1 and 2, we now come to a moment of significant change. It’s never enough to know certain information, there always has to be a moment when we act on what we know. That’s when real change begins to anchor itself in our lives.  And that’s what the core of Step 3 is all about.