July 1 - Faithful Today

Progress over perfection — but not as an excuse. Corey closes out his solo run drawing a hard line between spiritual progress and using "I'm an alcoholic" as a license to keep hurting people. Progress is not about perfection. It is about doing what is right today and trusting that it is enough. Corey opens with the line he's heard misused in too many rooms — page 60's we claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection — and pushes back hard. Having a drinking problem doesn't give anyone a checkmark to harm others and shrug it off with "I'll make amends." He's not blaming anyone anymore. He's been the problem his whole life, and page 62's our troubles are basically of our own making is a lot simpler than making it everyone else's fault. His order of operations, straight from his sponsor: home first, occupation, then his affairs — and he doesn't get to treat the people closest to him badly because he has a spiritual malady, because he has steps to work through it. From there he builds a remarkable literature thread: page 86's nightly review and the warning not to drift into morbid reflection, Colossians 3:23 — whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord — page 75's fifth-step promise that the drink problem has disappeared, the 7th-step prayer and its "my Creator" because God is recreating his life, and page 62's truth that we can't reduce our self-centeredness on our own power — God does it. He traces "faith without works is dead" across pages 14, 76, and 88, and connects the spiritual experience of page 75 to the amends of page 79. Page 28 lands the close: what seemed at first a flimsy reed has proved to be the loving and powerful hand of God. A new life has been given us — or if you prefer, a design for living that really works. I do not need to see the finished result. I need to trust the One who is shaping me. Christian recovery | 12-step faith | sobriety devotional | progress not perfection | spiritual malady | faith without works | the 7th step prayer | addiction recovery | AA and faith | sober living Daily entries at dailyripples.com — [email protected] Daily Ripples connects recovery principles with the life of faith. New episodes every day.