Road To Recovery - Coming Clean

Road To Recovery - Coming Clean
John 8:2-11
John 3:14-15

Principle #1 – Reality
Principle #2 – Hope
Principle #3 – Choice
Principle #4 – Action

• Principle 1 - Realize I'm NOT God!
• I admit that I am powerless to control my tendency to do the wrong thing and my life is unmanageable.
• Matthew 6:3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
  • "Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor"

The Second Step to R.E.C.O.V.E.R.Y

• Principle 2 – Earnestly believe that God exists, that I matter to him, and that he has the power to help me recover.
• Hebrews 11:6 “But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”
• Matthew 5:4 “Happy are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted

The Third Step to R.E.C.O.V.E.R.Y

• Principle 3 – Consciously choose to commit all my life and will to Christ’s care and control.
• Matthew 11:28 “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
• Matthew 5:5 “Happy are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”

The Fourth Step to R.E.C.O.V.E.R.Y

• Principle 4 – Openly examine and confess my faults to God, to myself, and to someone I trust.
• Psalm 32:1-2 “Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered. 2 Blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no deceit.”
• Matthew 5:5 “Happy are the pure in heart.”

The reason for this step!

1. None of us is faultless.

• Romans 3:23 “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”
• As a result we carry guilt around—sometimes consciously, but most of the time unconsciously.
  • Many or our actions are a result caused by unconscious guilt.
  • We may deny the guilt. We may repress the guilt. We may blame other people for our guilt. We may excuse our guilt. We may rationalize our guilt.
  • But we still feel the effects of it.

2. We must let go of guilt.

• Rationalizing is telling myself in my mind that it’s OK when I know in my heart it was wrong.
• Psalm 32:1-2 “What happiness for those whose guilt has been forgiven. What relief for those who have confessed their sins and God has cleared their record.”

3. Guilt destroys my confidence

• Exposure – You are always worried.
• Rejection – What if somebody find out?
• Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s note
  • Sent an anonymous note to five prominent men and it simply said this: “All is found out, flee at once.”
  • Within twenty-four hours all five men had left the country.

4. Guilt damages my relationships

• To respond to people in wrong ways:
  • Guilt can make me impatient with other people.
  • Guilt can cause me to overreact in anger.
  • Guilt can cause you to spoil people, indulge people.
  • Guilt can cause you to avoid commitment in relationship.

5. Guilt keeps me stuck in the past

• Like driving and always looking in the rearview mirror.
  • You’re going to end up crashing if you do that.
  • It gives perspective but you don’t constantly look at it.
  • If you’re always looking at a rearview mirror you never get ahead.
  • It makes you sick!
• Psychiatrists say that probably 70% of the people in the hospital could leave today if they knew how to resolve their guilt.
• When I swallow my guilt my stomach keeps score.
• If I don’t talk it out to God and to others I take it out on myself.

“You will never succeed in life if you try to hide your sins. Confess them and give them up, then God will show mercy to you.”
Proverbs 28:13 GNB

How Do I Take This Step?

1. Take a personal moral and spiritual inventory.

• Alone with a pen and paper, answering:
  • What have I felt guilty, regret or remorseful about?
  • What are the faults in my life that I know need changing?”
  • And you ask God to help you out.
• Lamentations 3:40 “Let us examine our ways and test them.”
• Psalm 139:23–24 “Search me O God, and know my heart. Test my thoughts, point out anything you find in me that makes you sad.”
• Why in writing?
  • Because it forces you to be specific.
  • Thoughts disentangle themselves when they pass through the lips and the fingertips.

2. Accept responsibility for my faults.

• Proverbs 20:27 “The spirit of a man is the lamp of the Lord, searching all the inner depths of his heart.”
  • Paraphrased = “The Lord gave us a mind and a conscious. We cannot hide from ourselves.”
• The greatest holdup to the healing for my hang-up is me.
• Don’t rationalize or minimize it.
  • If it’s no big deal how come you still remember it twenty years later?
• I John 1:8 “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”
  • Phillips translation: “We live in a world of illusion.”
  • Living Bible: “We’re only fooling ourselves.”
• If I really want to stop defeating myself, I’ve got to stop deceiving myself.

3. Ask God for forgiveness.

• I John 1:9 “If we freely admit that we have sinned we find God utterly reliable. He forgives our sin and makes us thoroughly clean from all that is evil.”
• How not to get forgiveness from God:
  1. Don’t beg.
  2. Don’t bargain.
  3. Don’t bribe.
  4. You just believe.

4. Admit my faults to another person

• James 5:16 “Admit your faults to one another and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”
• Why do I need to drag another person into this?
  • Because the root of our problem is relational.
  • The secrets I hold onto are the secrets that make me sick.
  • God says, “Revealing your feelings is the beginning of healings.”
• John 3:14-15 “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

5. Accept God’s forgiveness and forgive myself.

• Romans 3:23–24 TLB “All of us have sinned … yet not God declares us not guilty if we trust in Jesus Christ, who freely takes away our sins.”
• How does God forgive?
  • God forgives instantly, freely, completely.
• Romans 8:1 “There is no condemnation for those who live in union with Christ Jesus”

“I have seen how they acted but I will heal them, I will lead them and help them and I will comfort those who mourn. I offer peace to all near and far.”
Isaiah 57:18