I'm in Fort Worth right now, with one of my sponsees, as he goes around making his amends. As I watch him go through this process, with a certain amount of pride I might add, something builds inside of me. I am having a hard time verbalizing it, putting it into words, but the best I can do is speak from my own experience.
When I went through my own process of amends, I was worried. I was worried that for all of my sins, I was unforgivable. That even if the Lord could forgive me, I would be alone in a world alienated from my friends. Even so, shaky and worried, I made my amends to my father (step 9: made direct amends to those we had harmed unless to do so would injure them or otheres), and with eyes pleased, calm, and some what sympathetic, he says to me: "I just want you to be happy. I just want you to stay sober and be happy. That's your amends to me." He said nothing of forgiveness, and he didn't have to. I knew I was forgiven the moment he called me his son- again.
Then, there were my friends I thought I were going to lose. I asked for forgiveness and what I could to make things right, and like my friend Shaun said to me, "buddy, you were forgiven even before you asked." And here's the kicker. He says, "I love you, man. I just want you to be happy and sober."
And then, probably the closest friend I have in the world, Felix, comes up, drives to Kerrville, and visits me like nothing happens- like I never took advantage of our friendship of his trust. He tells me of his life and listens to my opinions like I deserve to give them, and he treats me like any other human being. He says, "I love you, bud. You look good and happy. I'm glad for you."
So, let's take a pause from the linearity of the post look at some scripture that comes to mind for me.
1) 2 Cor. 5:17- Therefore if anyone in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
2) Isiah 65:17-19- For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; and the former things will not be remembered or come to mind. But be glad and regoice forever in what I create; For behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing and her people for gladness. I will also rejoice in Jerusalem and be glad in My people; And there will no longer be heard in her the voice of weeping and the of crying.
3) Eph. 4: 11-16- Andhe gave some as aposles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of faith, and of the knowledge of faith, and of the knowledge of the son of God, to am mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a reslt, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in decietful schemind, but speaking truth in love, we are the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
As I look at all these scriptures, I derive theses conclusions:
1- I am a new creature. My sins have been forgiven truly by the Lord and I have been born again.
2- Like Shaun pointed out, I am supposed to be happy- we are all supposed to be happy. That is our purpose- to rejoice and to continue to rejoice in the Lord and all that the Lord has provided for us.
3- That Love is the ultimate. I could've written down, Love thy neighbor as you love thyself, but we all know that one. At that point, Love is crucial to glorify the Lord (we must build up his body).
4- We must share his our love, his love, all love, with everyone.
So, as I cruise around with my sponsee, and I see him make amends to all these people and places that he's harm, and see the suprise on his face as all the people that he at once felt he hurt so painfully, forgive him such ease. I see the Lord working in his life. I see the promises of the twelve step program in his life working. I feel the recovery working in his life.
I saw his grandmother cry as he asked for forgiveness, and she said the very thing Shaun said to me. And, as him and I left her house, she hugs me and thanks me from the bottom of her heart for helping her little Eric out. And I was touched. I wanted to cry. I wanted to reach out to that woman and tell her that everything will be alright. That it was a bad dream, that he's just diabetic or something. But the truth, his truth, my truth, glares so brightly in her eyes, in her tears, that I thank her and I say, "Eric has helped me more than you can understand, trust me."
And that's all I can say. I am moved.
I have been thinking lately, why I have so much sentimentality for College Station. It's because in recovery, people drop like flies. It's not like when I moved to college, and I moved into a dorm, and I felt home sick at first, but I made some friends, had some stable relationships, and finally settled in. No, not in Kerrville's sandbox of recovery. You just don't know when someone's going to drop. Just one day, you don't see them around, and then you hear that they pissed dirty, and you shake your head and that's another number deleted off of your cell phone.
At first, you feel for the people that relapse. You feel sorry. At least, I did. I wanted to help them so much. I wanted to find them immediately. Hug them, tell them it will be alright, and them try to get them to a meeting. Then, I realized something happened, and I don't know when. I became numb. They relapse, and I just don't care. It's not that I don't care for them. I love them. It's just that I now that there's nothing I could've done. When I see them again I will reach out my hand to them, and it's up to them to grab it- but I will not shed another tear for those who do not take my hand, just for those whose hands rests limply on the cold floor as a statistic ready to be tabulated.
I just realized that telling them it's going to be alright is bullshit. I'm passed that point. It's life and here people, and it's sometimes hard to see that. It's not going to be alrigt, everything is not going to go the way you always want it. Just stand up and take it as it comes. What we need are God, the steps, and serenity- and serenity is not when everything is calm around is, but when everything is chaotic around us, but we are calm on the inside. We are not body with souls, but souls with bodies.
So I became numb. Like a doctor that sees so much death, I became numb. And then, I came to Fort Worth, and my sponsee's grandmother hugged me and I had to fight tears. I don't know what I have really done. I just thought I was working a program, but instead, I forgot, I was in the program of saving lives. I think I lost sight of something so critical: behind the drug addict is a person, a son, a daughter, a brother, sister, mother, father, lover, painter, singer, lover, Christian, Buddhist, child of God. And with my tears came memories of better times that were washed away with the rain.
So today, I grew up a bit. And my ego was shrunken a bit.