Meet the Team & Principle 5

I'm Nate, and I'm a greatful beliver in Jesus Christ.  I serve as a Trainer for the Celebrate Recovery Leadership T.E.A.M. at Memorial Road Church of Christ, and I celebrate recovery from pornography for more than 4 years.    

The great thing about recovery in Jesus Christ is that it is remarkably simple.  Not easy, but simple. I love Principle 5 for this very reason.

Principle 5: Voluntarily Submit to every change God wants to make in my life and humbly ask him to remove my character defects.

 

Most of us come into recovery with a pretty good idea of the junk in our lives that we’d like to get rid of, but after we go through the difficult task of writing and sharing our inventory (Principle 4)…there is usually little doubt. We’ve identified entire lists of things that we’d like to change in our lives; the hurts and resentments that we carry because of what’s been done to us, the guilt and shame for things we’ve done to others and all the different ways of acting out we tried in order to protect ourselves.

When we come to Principle 5 God says: “well, lets make the changes.”

And yet, we tend to overcomplicate things. We come to Principle 5 and we ask ourselves: “How do I submit to every change God wants to make in my life?” and “what do I submit?” The fear of change kicks in and we begin to rationalize. We overcomplicate the step or we turn it into something that is so hyper-spiritual that it becomes too monumental a task for us to even know where to begin. And so we get stuck over-thinking and end up doing nothing to actually work Principle 5 except answering the questions in our step-study books.

All the while God is simply saying: “You know that thing that got you into recovery? It’s time to give it up…and let me start working on your heart”

There’s a give and take associated with this step that we often times misunderstand.

God will not simply take away the habit. He asks us to give the habit up, voluntarily. It’s through the surrender of our habits that God promises us that he will work to remove the character defects that push us toward the habits in the first place.

A simple way that I’ve found to work Principle 5 is called a 90-day contract. This is in no-way associated with the CR curriculum and it is not a requirement of any Celebrate Recovery Program, but rather I was introduced to it through some Christian Counselors who are experts in the field of sexual addiction.

The idea is this: take the sin, the habit, the coping mechanism or the problem that you came to recovery for and promise to give it up for 90-days. Write up a simple contract that states how you will not engage in your particular behavior, how you will commit yourself to prayer, specifically that God will remove your character defects as you voluntarily submit your habit over to him for the next 90-days. Find accountability partners who will work this contract with you. Commit yourself to rigorous honesty with your accountability group. Sign it, date it, exchange phone numbers, and watch God work over the next 90-days!

You’ll be amazed the simplicity of Principle 5 and the Power of Your Almighty God to give you freedom from your Hurts, Hang-ups and Habits.

A grateful believer,

Nate