God's Amazing Work

Let's see if I can keep it on track tonight.

I've been attending a Celebrate Recovery class for several months now, since the end of May 2010. If you don't know, it's a 12 step program like AA but fully Christian oriented. We have a little social time for the first half hour, a few show up for that. I like to be one of them, but if things are running late it's the easy thing to cut out of the evening. The next hour is dedicated to Bible Study and a lesson plan that's geared towards recovery. After a short break for bathrooms and cigs for the smokers (I gave that one up almost 3 years ago now, drinking was tougher I think) we split up into groups for men and women. This allows for a separate kind of sharing because it allows for the unique differences between how men and women think and share.

I have a pair of friends, they're a couple that have 2 children together and a history of drugs and alcohol. They've both been clean and sober for 8 months now (YEAH!). I've known him for almost 20 years now, and her for just a couple. They reside some distance away in downtown Seattle and attend AA meetings and counseling up there. They recently had to sell their car just to have a Christmas at all.

I've been trying to get them down into my area for months now to come to my C.R. class. He's been blowing me off for a long time now and finally I guess I just wore him down. God decided enough pussy footin around and put it in his heart to make the hour long bus ride with her, after he talked her into it too. Bear in mind they were facing another hour long bus ride to get home afterward. So this was a substantial time commitment for them.

Anyway, they finally came down, met me at my work, which probably saved about 45 minutes of bus time on top of the hour they had already been on for, and I took them to my house and fed them a decent dinner. Dinner was kind of part of the hook to getting them down. Then she found out that the whole meeting was 2 1/2 hours! "What? 2 1/2 hours? That's crazy, you didn't tell me that!" She was a bit surprised at that information. But we calmed her down with Starbucks before the meeting, so she had a good attitude for it (I'm kind of kidding here, she had a good attitude throughout, but the time took her by surprise).

I gave them a run down of how these meeting work and she was happy because she had been thinking she wanted more God in her life. I told her nearly everything in my life has God in it, so she was going to get some either way if the came around my house (cue the laugh track). Turns out that was exactly what she needed. He did too. They both found themselves sharing and asking questions. Opening up and talking about the kind of things you just don't normally do with people you just met. Later on he told me that it just felt safe and compelling to talk. I give that to God. He provided an environment where 2 people who were normally very guarded and not open with new people could safely open up.

In spite of all the difficulties to come down here, guess where they're planning on being this Friday?

It's all God's Amazing Work and it brings tears to my eyes to see Him at work in my friends. If you've tried to help friends that blow you off time and time again, if you know it's God's work, keep trying. Just smile when they make that next excuse and then try again. I never put them down, I never asked what their problem was, I never took it personally, I just kept inviting them.