Listen and Obey

Be sure that you don’t say no to the One who speaks. People did not escape when they said no to the One who warned them on earth. And what if we turn away from the One who warns us from heaven? How much less will we escape! Hebrews 12:25

A belief I have held since entering Bible-based recovery in 1989 is “Most people fail in recovery because they don’t plan not to.”  Many people with good intentions and the right motivations enter rehabs and do well. Then at the end of their time, they leave rehabs and go back to ‘the real world’ without a plan of how they are going to manage their addictions and compulsions going forward. Sure they plan to attend meetings but what else? The ‘Big Book’ of ‘Alcoholics Anonymous’ says ‘We deal with alcohol, cunning, baffling and powerful.’ And, the reality is unless we have a plan of how we are going to live differently, act differently and think differently we are setting ourselves up for failure.

As we begin to experience success in recovery it is easy for us to convince ourselves we no longer need to apply what we have learned through the process. It is easy for us to convince ourselves we have our addictions and compulsions beaten.

When we start thinking that way we are on the ‘Road to Relapse’ Living Life Recovery requires careful planning of living and applying all we have learned to our daily living so we can continue living and growing spiritually with God’s help.

RELAPSE handout