Living as if God is at work
Perhaps more challenging than acknowledging our own limitations (after all we have plenty of experience in that department) is making sense of this notion that God can remove our shortcomings. We struggle to understand who God is and how he works in our lives.
Father Joe Martin entered treatment for alcoholism in 1958. His recovery experience gave him the unique capacity to help ease the suffering of those affected by substance use disorder. Once Father Martin talked to Terence T. Gorski, author of Understanding the Twelve Steps, about God’s role in the Sixth Step. Father Martin said, “God gives us the courage, the strength, and the means whereby to correct our character defects. But we’ve got to do the correcting,”[4]
We ask for guidance, inspiration, courage and strength. We trust God is listening. We wake up each morning mindful that we have asked God to remove our defects AND we go about living as if he has done so. Suppose my husband asks me how much I paid for the new rug he discovers in our entrance foyer. We have a housing budget and we are on the verge of going over budget. If I tell him the rug cost $50.00, then all is well. The budget can absorb it. But what if the rug cost $150.00? I am going to be $75.00 over budget. This is going to raise more questions about my commitment to our shared budget goals. I don’t want the hassle. There is a good chance I can get away with telling him $50.00 because he would not know the difference.
But I would know that I was lying. Dishonesty is a shortcoming that I have given God the green light to remove. I can tell the truth and this gives me the encouragement of knowing that God is at work and I am working at believing God. If I lie, I realize that this particular defect is alive and well and I have to go back to the drawing board and figure out what’s up with my lying. This will initiate the amends process. Either way, I am not without hope. I have a plan for dealing with my shortcomings even as I have hope that God is removing them.
Either way, I have work to do. I prepare each day to live as if all my shortcomings are removed by practicing living without them. I have other steps to practice at the end of the day when I review my day and discover that God is not done with me yet.
