Month: March 2019

Principle 5: We may always feel the gravity of the flesh, but we are not meant to live enslaved to it. We are meant to know and experience freedom daily in Christ. For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:1 I wrote…
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Principle 4: Though God may graciously deliver us from some thorns of the flesh, some battles are lifelong, requiring the ongoing work of denying self and following Christ. A thorn was given me in the flesh . . . Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he…
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That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, “You must be born again.” John 3:6-7 Principle 3: When we come faith in Jesus Christ, we are born again into a new, perfect spirit life and restored to…
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Principle 2: We all struggle with flaws in our corrupt flesh nature, though it has different manifestations in all of us. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. Galatians 5:19-21 When life fell…
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Principle 1: God created us to live in communion with Him, but man’s sin fractured that communion. When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband. Genesis 3:6 As I was walking out on the still-frozen lake recently,…
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Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. Luke 11:9 From time to time, we all have existential questions regarding our faith and the meaning of life. Why am I here? Usually, these are just curiosities for which we don’t really expect an…
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Step 12: Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in all our affairs. Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you. Luke 8:39 I wish I could say that my inpatient chemical dependency treatment…
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Step 11: We 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. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your…
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Step 10: We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Philippians 3:12 I ran a distance race last fall, for which…
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Step 9: We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother,…
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