Coming Soon...

How many of you wish you would have found CR when you were a teen?  I know I do!  My need for approval didn’t start when I was 34 years old…I think I was more like 10!!  I didn’t start using food to cope with my emotions when I got married; it was when I was an adolescent.   These unhealthy patterns were full blown BAD HABITS by the time I was a teen, and then they just continued to spiral out of control the older I got.

I think that’s one reason why I am so excited that MRCC is beginning The Landing! (If you haven’t heard much about The Landing yet, that’s okay…it’s new and you’ll be hearing a lot more about it over the coming weeks!)

The Landing is an all-new, year-long program that helps teenagers travel the path to freedom, healing, and wholeness. This dynamic resource mirrors the content presented in the successful Celebrate Recovery program.

The lessons deliver hope-filled truths and real-life strategies for giving young people the tools for making wise choices and developing healthy patterns for living.

The program will be offered at MRCC in conjunction with our CR program each Friday night and lessons are designed for junior high and high school students.   They will meet from 7-9 in the Summit and the lessons will be very open and hands on!   (There are a few differences between CR and The Landing: The Landing does not have students introduce themselves with their hurt, habit or hangup, students will not do testimonies or written inventories.  They will have private journal and prayer time.)

Kick-off night is January 21st, please be praying that God, once again, uses this program to change lives!

There are several of us from the MRCC Celebrate Recovery program that have committed to helping with the Landing, but we can always use more leadership!  If you are interested in serving and have completed a Step Study, please let Micah know!

Grateful Believer,

Karyn

Christmas Memories

I just want to say thanks to everyone who donated to help buy gifts for kids sponsored through the Anna's House Foundation.   We took up a donation on December 3rd and... 

we raised more than $925!!  

The night of the contribution I found myself overwhelmed with emotion.  My husband asked me on the way home why it was such an emotional thing for me.  I just thought I would share my answer with all of you.

I have so many wonderful memories of Christmas morning.  Running in to the tree to see just what Santa had brought me.  While my family was not wealthy I always got that one gift I really wanted.  I remember having so much joy. Imagining some child not ever having those memories breaks my heart.  Having the chance to be a part of maybe bring one child that joy really means a lot to me.  I hope that these kids can remember this Christmas.

God tells us to love one another.  To me, this is just one way we can all show love to a child we may never meet.  Again, Anna's House is a Christian organization that helps Christian foster families.  So, I also feel that we are helping those families, who may not have the funds, show those kids they do love them.  In turn, maybe someday the love these families show them will translate to a relationship with Christ. 

As you can see by the pictures here, we were able to provide...lots of clothes, toys and, of course, cars with flames!

There was more money than we needed for these gifts.  We offered to buy for more children, but Anna's House did not have more in need.  Since that was the case we gave Anna's House the extra money.  They plan to use it to help provide these same families with food this Christmas.

 

I feel so blessed to have joined with each of you in providing gifts for these children whom we may never know.  Thank you for all you donated, whether it was your money or your prayers.

Merry Christmas!

Grateful Believer,

Chellie

A better answer...

I’ve been asked three times about the blue wristband/bracelet that I wear. Here’s how those conversations went:

“So what kind of wristband is that? What does it represent?” asked a co-worker.

“Celebrate Recovery,” I tell him. “It’s a Christ-centered recovery program that I’m involved in.”

“That’s that Rick Warren thing, right?”

I spent the next few minutes talking with him about CR and the hope it brings to those who are hurting. I think all he heard was “blah blah, Rick Warren, blah, Jesus, blah.”

The next conversation was with a friend’s 7-year-old.

“What’s that say on your bracelet?” he asked.

“It says ‘Celebrate Recovery’” I replied.

“Oh.” End of conversation.

I realized after these two conversations that I had to figure out a better answer for this question. In order to do that, I had to take some time to figure out exactly what the bracelet really means to me.

By the third asking, I was ready.

Helping out with the 1^st graders at church one Wednesday evening, I got the question.

“Why do you wear that?” he asked, pointing at my wrist.

“It reminds me to make good decisions” was my answer.

And that was it. It was what I knew all along.

Recovery is about making good decisions, one decision at a time. The more I make good decisions, the easier the recovery process gets. I grow closer to God, my family, and my friends. The good decisions add up, and when I find myself faced with big choices that can hurt me, it’s easier to choose the one that leads me closer to God.

The best decision isn’t always the easy one, or the most pleasant, but I wear a daily reminder that I’m not in this alone. When I slip because of a poor choice, the blue around my wrist is a gentle reminder that there’s another opportunity to make things right again.

The blue CR wristband is available online at Celebrate Recovery Gear. Better yet, visit CR@MRCC Friday nights to learn how to heal through good decision making.

The best decision you’ll make is the one that brings you closer to Christ.

Grateful Believer,

Morgan

Cunning, Baffling, and Powerful

The AA "Big Book” calls alcohol “cunning, baffling, and powerful.” It also says that “without help it (meaning alcohol) is too much for us.” The “Big” Big Book (the Bible) says in Romans 7:15-18: “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.”

When I began drinking regularly at age 16 I simply liked the “feeling” alcohol gave me. This is the “cunning” part of alcohol - because long after I lost the peace alcohol had once given me, I continued to think the next time I drank I would have that peace again. Alcohol was “baffling” in that even after a drunk driving car wreck my freshman year in college, multiple blackouts, another drunk driving wreck as a car passenger, an arrest for public intoxication, and other incidents (things much worse than mentioned here, but I’m not ready to put them in a blog) I still thought “I can control my use of alcohol!” And finally it is “powerful.” I would tell myself “I am not drinking today” and I would later that day find myself drinking again. I once quit drinking for 42 days and as soon as I had the next “first drink” I was quickly back to drinking like I had before. I even quit for six months at age 22, I thought I had alcohol beat, but as soon as I drank again it was if I had been drinking all along and not long after I had one of my worst blackout episodes.

It wasn’t until six more years passed, at age 28, that I had my last drink (one day at a time) and have not had a drink in over 16 years. The difference between the last time I drank and all of the times before was that previously I had tried to stop with my willpower instead of using the power of God. Earlier in this entry I quoted Romans 7:15-18. This scripture reminds me that while there may be a part of me that wants to quit using alcohol there will always be another part of me that wants to do what I hate to do. Therefore my will power will never be enough because sin lives in me. It doesn’t matter what hurt, hang up, or habit I have, as long as I live I will always have a sinful nature. It is this knowledge of self that makes Romans 8:1-5 so incredible!

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. Those who live according to the sinful nature have their mind set on what nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their mind set on what the Spirit desires.”

Every day when I wake up I am an untreated alcoholic/sinner and every day I get on my knees and seek His will because I deal with an addiction that is cunning, baffling, and powerful and because I have a sinful nature that invites me to do what I don’t want to do. It is comforting to know that all I need to do every minute and every day is to be willing to submit to his power instead of my own and I am free. There is no special key needed to unlock this power it is a simple decision that I make. There is no special intelligence needed only the humility to let God be in control and for me to get out of the way.

Grateful Believer,

Sheldon