Shining the Light On Recovery Ministry

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — His good, pleasing and perfect will. Romans 12:2

As you may have recently heard, last night Pastor Eric hosted a meeting at his house for anyone who is interested in recovery ministry. Many of you know, over the past several months we have been looking at beginning a Celebrate Recovery ministry here at St. Paul’s. However, as we went forward with that idea, we ran into various difficulties. So yesterday, 25 people from our church met to discuss the future of recovery ministry here at St. Paul’s. Celebrate Recovery is still one of the ideas that we are looking into, but we may go another direction as well depending on the needs and desires of the people. One of the ideas was to have small groups that meet that are focused on various issues, such as divorce, depression, or other related issues.

One of the things I love about Celebrate Recovery is its focus on the words hurts, habits, and hang-ups. Everybody has issues in their lives and everyone can benefit from putting the steps and principles of Celebrate Recovery or Alcoholics Anonymous into their lives. A lot of people think that just because their issue doesn’t involve drugs or alcohol, there is no need to seek help for it. Maybe you have an issue with lusting or gambling or anger and you think that just because it’s not destroying your life in a way that other people can see, it’s okay and you’ve got it under control. The truth is, Satan loves it when we rationalize our problems in this way. It means we are just going to keep doing the same thing we have been doing and it’s going to hurt our walk with God. The further we distance ourselves from God, the easier it is for Satan to grab hold.

It was great to be able to hear what was on the hearts of those in attendance at last night’s meeting and what they would like to see happen here at St. Paul’s. It is obvious that there is a great need and desire for a recovery ministry in our church and that the 25 who came last night represented just a small number of those in our church who are hurting and need support. We will be having another meeting/brainstorming session in a few weeks and I would encourage anyone who wants to learn more about recovery to come and just listen. The purpose of these meetings is to talk about the next steps in this process. Just know that no matter what your issue is, no matter how much you’re hurting or how much you don’t think someone else would understand, there are indeed others out there struggling with your issue and probably right here in this church. There is something special about a community of believers leaning on each other. I look forward to seeing God work in the hearts of people here at St. Paul’s and am eagerly waiting to see where He takes us next.

Yours in Christ,

Jarvis