Speaker 2 00:00:27 Yeah. I don't know what we're gonna do without you,
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Speaker 2 00:00:35 We can write letters, ,
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Speaker 1 00:01:24 That's the first thing. And who honor God in your lifestyle. That's the second thing. But we believe that you haven't really experienced life to the full, which Jesus talks about in John 10 10, until you make disciples, until you pass it on, until you help someone else to pursue God. In other words, a pursuit of God. At the end of the day, surprise, surprise isn't just all about yourself, a pursuit of God. Actually, Jesus had this in mind. All along. A pursuit of God is about other people and your impact on other people. And would you guys say that that's true for recovery? That just maybe the reason God allowed you guys to have an addiction in the first place is so that you could sit here in this podcast so that you can run the groups that you run and you can impact other people that in, in, in other words, almost God, maybe even allowed that to come into your life so that he could get glory out of it through your experience, which is so much better than my experience in this area. You guys have obviously helped far more people with recovery than I ever have. And a big part of that is because you've experienced it, right?
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Speaker 2 00:03:21 And, and so many people have asked me before, like, if you could go back, would you change things or, or do you regret the things that you did? And I, I guess I would say I regret sin. You know, I'm repentant of sin. I don't, I hate sin. I don't like that. I want to go my way and not God's way. But I would also say that I'm not sure if I believe that there was any other way that was laid out for me to do. Um, because of the path that I went down, the people that I've been able to impact. Um, just today I had a meeting with a guy and was able to share my story, and it caused him to open up and tell me things, tell me things in our first meeting ever that he probably hasn't told people that have that, that tried to meet with him for years.
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Speaker 1 00:05:00 . Well, you were the, you're not normal Aaron . And I'm very thankful for that. Mark, what are we talking about here? What, what exactly is the final step? What exactly is step number 12?
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Speaker 1 00:06:02 . And here's why I love it so much. And I just learned this statement from you, mark. So I might butcher it. You might have to correct me, but I'm gonna try it. You said you can't keep something unless you give it away. Did I say it right? Mm-hmm. , mm-hmm. . And it's, that's an AA thing, right? Yeah. Yeah. And we, we@pursuegod.org. We've said that for years now. We just haven't said it so beautifully as that. You can't keep something unless you give it away. And I really believe it that when you, you know, your journey is incomplete un unless you start helping somebody else on the journey. And I would imagine guys, that some people might listen, be listening to this podcast, and maybe they're still working the steps, right? Mm-hmm. , maybe they're still back at step three or four or five, so they're not quite here yet, but they're getting a preview of what they're eventually gonna be at. I would imagine, tell me if this is true, that there are a lot of addicts that are saying, you're crazy. There's no way, there's no way I'm qualified to help somebody else. What would you say? Have you ever seen that attitude? And what would you say to it?
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Speaker 2 00:08:13 Here's something that I want to say that's on my heart right now too with this step is, is that this, this step's about, you know, giving us a new purpose in life, um, helping us to refocus on what we're called to do, what we were made to do. And, you know, for so many addicts, we've wondered what we're supposed to do with our lives. We've had dreams, we've had aspirations, we've failed. We've, we've tried things and, and, and hurt people. And, and that might be a part of the reason why we self-medicate. But, um, at the end of the day, I know that probably a lot of you, if, if you've had this spiritual awakening that we're talking about, you know, um, that you felt a pull on your life to do something great, greater to step outside of yourself and do something greater, not for yourself, but for, for the Lord.
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Speaker 1 00:09:50 Movie, I love you, man,
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Speaker 2 00:10:46 You can be someone that you never thought you could be because you have God with you, God on your side. I've done things that I never thought I'd be capable of doing or able to do or qualified to do. But because the Lord wants to use me and use you for a purpose, um, he's, he's, he's going to qualify you in ways that you didn't even think were possible. And so I just, I just want to encourage people to, um, dream about what you can do, but not for yourself, but for the Lord and for other people.
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Speaker 1 00:12:16 There's a, there's kind of an extreme personality for an addict. That's kind of why I think maybe you, you kind of almost need, a lot of times you need the substance to get, to get enjoyment out of life. Almost like a a someone else might not need that. They might not live on the, on the extremes. They might live a little bit more in the middle. Mm-hmm. , I would say I probably live more in the middle in my life. But I, what I love about you guys and other people that I've, that I've known that have come out of addiction is there is like an abandon to them. They take the way that they're naturally wired, and then God uses it in incredible ways. And, and, and that's, that can happen for everyone listening to this today. God calls you and a and a key to your, to your recovery and your continued freedom is helping someone else. If you don't help someone else, you're probably not gonna keep your, your sobriety. Mm-hmm. , right?
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Speaker 2 00:14:13 And so that's kind of what this step, you know, reminded me, says, if after having a, a spiritual awakening, well, yes, of course. We were born again as the Bible says, you know, made new by the Spirit regenerated. And after having that, now we've got, we got not just, I mean we, it says tools. Mm-hmm. , but really, I mean, we have the, like we have the ultimate power tool . We've got, we've got the Holy Spirit, God himself residing in us. And with that comes all of the fruits of the spirit we've talked about in, in, in all of these steps. You know, with the Holy Spirit comes all of these giftings and abilities. And along with how God made us to now go and, and use them for another purpose. You know, we used our craftiness, our shrewdness in a worldly way back in the day. And, and we used it to go get our fix. But now God's gonna take that along with combining his spirit with us to be able to go do great things and, and, and wise things. And even, you know, it just reminds me of the parable of the shrewd manager, you know, where we can even be, um, wise in that way, but to build God's kingdom and to help other addicts and, and other people in general, you know? Mm-hmm. ,
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Speaker 3 00:16:38 And it does, it, it it's given us this, this way now that we do have, we can live this purposeful life. And I love when you, when you mentioned that earlier, Brian, about, um, he doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies the called. And it, and it totally reminded me of when Eric, I'd been coming to your group for, I don't know, a year or two, and you wanted, you wanted to start another group, and you asked Charissa and I to lead it , and that's exactly where I was. I remember saying something to you like, are you sure? Are you sure about that? And that was the statement that you said to me Exactly. Word for word. And I, and that stuck with me. And it was just, I, I just went, I just went with it. I just trusted that God's gonna, God's gonna do something. I trusted you, um, first and then, you know, I I, I learned to trust in God with it. And he did, he, you know, used an imperfect broken person like me. And, and, um, I've, I've helped people the same way that, that you helped me. And that's, that's the beautiful part of all this. Well,
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Speaker 1 00:18:28 Keep watching yourself, let you two be tempted. So it's the sense that I get when I read that is that there's a responsibility on your life when you've been aw. Like the, like the step says when you've been awakened, when you've had your spiritual awakening, when your eyes are opened now. And you know, the crazy thing about God opening your eyes is when he opens your eyes, he gets the focus off of you and onto other people. And that's really what gives you the freedom to serve other people and to overcome maybe your insecurities or, right. Mm-hmm. , because the question you asked Mark, when, when Eric said that the question you asked was coming probably from a place of, I don't view myself that way. I don't think you got the right guy. It's, it's really a question. Any kind of security gets us to focus on ourselves. Mm-hmm. and our inabilities. Where, where, where the more we, the more spiritual we are, the more connected to the vine we are, the less we focus on ourselves, the less we get kind of caught up in our own heads and afraid to step out and do what God is calling us to do. So I think you're very spiritual. You know, I don't know if Sharise would call you very spiritual or not, but mm-hmm.
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Speaker 1 00:19:37 . But to me that just means connected, connected to the vine and just flowing out of that relationship that you have mm-hmm. with God rather than flowing out of the natural stuff that you, that we're also used to flowing from.
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Speaker 1 00:20:48 So guys, is there a temptation for someone who's getting to the end of the steps? Is there a temptation for people to say, you know, thank you aa, thank you, God, thank you, Jesus, but I want to be done with this. I don't really want to run in, in these circles anymore. I don't, I don't want the label. I don't, I don't need the label. I'm over it. I'm good. Are there people that would sometimes say that just, just to say, I just want to be out away from this world and just live, like you said, Eric, live like a normal person now. Mm-hmm. . I'm not a recovering addict, I'm just a normal, I just wanna live a normal life.
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Speaker 2 00:22:23 It was like, I, I knew God was wanting me to do something with my story, but I didn't want to. And it, and it was almost like I w he was, he was, you know, causing me to suffer until I would, um, seek what he wanted for me to do. And, and that was when, like what I said earlier is we started these recovery groups and, and started going through these lessons, uh, in a biblical way. When I surrendered to that, finally I was like, okay, I guess I can't get out of it. , I guess I can't escape my past. And, um, now I realize that my past is not mine to even escape. You know, I think it's, this is, if I believe that God was, you know, in a, a lot of that and he was, he was sovereign and all of that, then what am I doing when I try to forget it and, and just kind of shove it under the rug and, and worry about people hearing about my story?
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Speaker 1 00:24:36 Second Corinthians one says, says it like this, verse three and four, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and God of all comfort. Now, pay attention to that word comfort, cuz you're gonna hear it a lot here, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. Mm-hmm. . Now, nothing like the extra spiritual version there. Mm-hmm. , I'm sure the NLT said it a little bit better than that, but , this was a good translation. It, you know, that's, that's what he, that's what Paul's saying there, is that God gave you, I mean, really, if you read between the lines, you get, you were given your affliction so that you could be comforted by God so that you could comfort someone else with the comfort that came from God. Mm-hmm. . So the comfort that you got, you get to pass on to the next person.
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Speaker 3 00:26:34 And whatever God did to bring me here, I'm grateful for that. Mm-hmm. , and, and yeah, this is, this is powerful. This is, this is now, it gives a purpose to what we've gone through. Just, just, um, being rescued from it and then trying to shove it in the past and forget about it. Well, what purpose does it serve? It's, it's nothing. It, it, it served no purpose. Now it can serve a purpose. Like, like Eric, you were talking about earlier. God works everything for good, for those who love him. You know, it says in in his word, and this is one of those things, he will use this for good. And it doesn't have to be a waste. So we shouldn't waste it. And if we don't take this out and use it, if we don't do step 12, go out and comfort people offer, offer, you know, the way that we've been helped offer that to other, other people, man, then we're, we're wasting it. We're wasting what we've
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Speaker 2 00:27:43 . Yeah. It's also a humbling thing too. It's, you know, rem when you're sharing your story a lot, you remember where you came from, so then the glory goes back to God and not yourself. Because that's one of humans' biggest problem, especially addicts, is pride. You know, you start to all of a sudden, you know, uh, get some success and get some blessing from God, and, uh, things are going well for you. And, and the natural response is to say, man, I got this thing licked. I've done a great job. I'm an awesome person, man. I am gifted. I have all these talents. I don't know why people wouldn't want to, you know, listen to me. Right? And, and, and that's what will happen. I, I promise you, because I've had those thoughts in my mind, and I'll just be honest, is, is that if I start to forget where I came from and all that God did in my life, then I start to again, go back to the selfish way of thinking, thinking that somehow I got myself out of this. Right. Like, and, you know, wanting to put on a, a fake face for everyone else. And so we need to share our stories to help other people and to also remember where we came from too.
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Speaker 1 00:28:59 . Now you say, the last thing you say here in this topic, Eric, is that the last step is really the first step back to the beginning, but with a new perspective. What do you mean by that?
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Speaker 1 00:30:31 Mm-hmm. , Jesus said it like this, but we gotta, we gotta end on this verse when we're talking about step 12, it really kind of comes all the way back to Matthew 20 eight's called the Great Commission. When Jesus Co mission means He, he wants us to go on mission with him co mission. And he says in verse 18 of Matthew 28, all authority in heaven on Earth has been given to me. And then in verse 19, he says, therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, son, holy Spirit. And teaching them to observe all the commandments that I've given you. And behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age. I love that passage. We could spend the next hour talking about it. But first thing that jumps out at me is he said, he says, the reason I want you to go is because I have authority.
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Speaker 1 00:32:13 I could see probably fear, anxiety coming over their faces. Probably like some people today listening to this saying, I don't know if I buy this one. I bought the first 11, but I don't, I think I'm gonna return number 12. I don't like this one. And that's why I think Jesus ended in verse 20 with this. He says, behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age. Hmm. You, you know, you've had a spiritual awakening. Jesus is with you. You're not going in your own strength. You're not going in your own power. You're not going with your own own comfort. You're going because you're, you're going cuz Jesus said to, and you're going with him, he's going with you. He's gonna be with you even as you go and help someone else.
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Speaker 3 00:33:43 I mean, that, that's the kind of stuff that God does mm-hmm. . And I know I've seen him do it in my life. I know you've seen him do it in your life. I'm sure Eric and you, Brian, where it, you know, he will give you the words, he'll speak through you. There are times where I, I, I didn't have any knowledge of something that I was discussing with somebody. And somehow he, he was able to just give me the words to say, Hmm, I've seen it many, many times. And, and so that's, that's where this really is. It's, he will be with us. Mm-hmm. He will. And we've already seen it, and he's gonna continue to do it.
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Speaker 2 00:35:07 And, and Peter decides, I'm just gonna go back to what I'm comfortable doing, what I know. Right? I'm gonna go back to the thing that I was doing before Jesus called me. And, and, and Jesus calls him and he says, Hey, you're not catching any fish out there. He is like, why don't you throw the net on the other side? And, and Peter's like, well, hey man, I'm a fisherman. I've been doing this for a while, , you know, I mean, if I the fisher, if they're not on this side, they're not on that side, right? And, and so Jesus says, no, throw the net on the other side. And Peter's like, all right, I'll do it. And, and they end up catching this huge catch, you know? And it's like, it's almost as if Jesus is saying, I control those fish. You know, I, I'm the one who has power over everything.
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Speaker 2 00:36:42 So much so that I'm willing to go die for, um, telling this message that he wants me to tell to the ends of the earth, to go make disciples, to be fishers of men. And he's such Peter's, such the, you know, such a great example that I, I feel like I can, I can relate to him out of everyone in the Bible mm-hmm. , um, because he had this zeal and passion to go and he, he changed and he was radical. And like you said, he preached the sermons and he was basically the leader of the disciples. Mm-hmm. You know, when he went on. And, um, God used a broken man to go do great things. And it's because Peter was willing to take this great commission seriously. And so for us as addicts, um, and this is, this is what I'm gonna say, like, don't have a peter moment and go fall back into what you used to do using, or or another way of life, a selfish way of life, because you're, you're fearful.
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Speaker 2 00:38:27 But first, and this is what I tell addicts all the time. Like, they, we get to this step and they're like, okay, we've had some clean time. We don't need to come to groups so much anymore. And, and you know what I usually see, it's like almost every one of those people ends up relapsing again. Mm-hmm. . Yeah. And this right here is, is really the, the way to not relapse. Mm-hmm. . It's, if you start going and helping other people and, and living out that commandment that Jesus gave every one of his followers, um, he will do a work in you that, that he had never done before. Because that is the purpose in which you can't have, um, continuous power flowing into you and not have it being poured out into other people. Like we are a vessel, we're a conduit. And so God promises to pour into us as we pour into other people.
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Speaker 1 00:40:38 . That's good. Mark, let's finish by reading step 12 one more time.
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Speaker 1 00:40:53 So find all of these conversations, all 12 steps online@pursuegod.org slash recovery. Use it in your recovery group. Use it one-on-one to disciple somebody. You can find all these podcasts there. You can find some videos to go along with it, discussion questions. It's all there. And so much more at pursue god.org/recovery.
