Author: lastwordrecovery

A Date With Destiny

Loved By God

lastwordrecovery

A Date With Destiny – July 20 – Happy Birthday!

2 Samuel 7:20

Lord God, you love me, your servant so much!

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You have a unique ability to internalize the insights which have come to you from the Spirit of God. This personal interaction creates a bond of admiration and affection between you and your Creator.

Your imagination is the canvass on which God paints a self-portrait, allowing you to see Him more clearly. In this sacred space, your love for Him grows deeper.

You recognize Him in places where no one else would think to look. You feel His supernatural strength propel you on your journey. You sense His compassion toward the hurting world around you. You recognize God’s goodness in your life and in the lives of those you love.

You know God is with you, even when you feel surrounded by darkness. You are confident that His light will always shine through, to guide and protect your path.

You identify God as a loyal and devoted ally who has your back and guards your future. You remember how He has appeared to you in some of your darkest hours. Therefore, you have no doubt He will always be there beside you, even when your perception of Him might be obscured by conflict, anxiety, or confusion.

God has always been your safe companion. From early childhood, you have sensed a supernatural bond between yourself and the Divine.

There have been times in your life when it seemed as if the skies opened, and you caught a glimpse of His majestic presence.  In those momentary flashes of clarity, you realized that God truly knows all about you, and His desire is for you to know all about Him too.

https://a.co/d/6czhw0u

A Date With Destiny

Merciful

lastwordrecovery

Micah 7:19

Lord, you will have mercy on us again. You will throw away all our sins into the deepest sea.

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Mercy is an attribute which comes easily for you. You have been blessed by both giving and receiving mercy.

You understand the mercy of God because you have received it abundantly.

While you may sometimes fail to make the right choices, your decision to accept God’s mercy for the wrong ones, is always the best choice you can make.

You are grateful for the opportunities you see to offer mercy to others.

While it is human nature to be concerned about the risks of being merciful, you believe there is a much greater risk to the human soul when one opts to become merciless.

You are grateful for the mercy of God which provides healing and restoration. Not only does He show mercy to the offender, He offers forgiveness for the wrong and cancelation of the debt. You find relief in the God’s promise that the entire ordeal is dropped into the depths of the sea. 

Like your Creator, you do not keep score. The mercy and forgiveness you learned from Him, enables you to wipe the slate clean and give everyone a fresh start.

Your appreciation for the mercy you have received is best displayed by your willingness to show it to others.

It is your gift of mercy that creates a firm  foundation for successful relationships.  It is also the defining force of your Christian walk, for only those who give and receive mercy can ever truly know the heart of God. 

https://a.co/d/3GkNxCb

Tetelestai Recovery

Stopped in His Tracks

lastwordrecovery

We noticed something remarkable about the ministry of Jesus. He had no schedule or agenda. His ministry was not directed by Himself, His apostles, or even by God. To our amazement, we realized that the ministry of Christ was determined by people. Without fail, when the slightest flicker of faith sparked, or a request for mercy was whispered, the Savior’s footsteps suddenly stopped.

Tetelestai Recovery / Chapter 8, Facts are Changeable

https://a.co/d/2g0nB5z

A Date With Destiny

Call of the Wild

lastwordrecovery

Genesis 7:15

The animals came to Noah in groups of two; every creature that had the breath of life.

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You enjoy a close bond with nature and find peace in the Great Creation. You have discovered the elusive tranquility that many others seek, by walking in harmony with the earth and all of its inhabitants.

You care deeply about animals and you understand their significance in the ecosystem of this planet. You sometimes prefer the company of animals to humans, because you appreciate their authenticity and non-judgmental acceptance.

You realize that the human connection to animals is a symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationship. You are grateful for the medical breakthroughs and scientific discoveries which have been made through the study of unique animal attributes.

You are amazed at the scope of human innovation which has been developed by observing the behaviors of animals. From the beginning of ancient civilizations in Noah’s day, to the modern era of technology, humans have relied upon the wisdom of the animal kingdom. It is a good person who values and protects the wildness of their world.

https://a.co/d/de7YYJV

Tetelestai Recovery

Dig Deep

lastwordrecovery

Initially, we feared awakening resentments and regret, but with God at our side, we grew confident that there was nothing we couldn’t face and forgive. As much as we felt our history was set in stone and fossilized forever, we claimed the following Sacred Text over our emotional excavation:

Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for me? Jeremiah 32:27

In time, we became willing to enter our valley of dry bones and speak life over what had been dead for so long.

We found the lifeless remains of enthusiasm, which had been suffocated by disappointment. We found fossils of unfinished projects, which might have been profound, had we not given up. We unearthed splintered fragments of gifts, talents, and abilities which had become casualties of our own sense of inadequacy.

Rather than viewing the carnage as evidence of a wasted life, we began to see it as dry bones coming back to life. By faith, we saw a powerful future rising up from the wreckage of our past.

In our New Normal, we spoke life over anything which reeked of death. In our New Normal, we commanded our dead dreams to rise up in service to our King. We did not think this was too much to expect, for we had been given the resurrection power of Christ. We had been urged to follow in the footsteps of our Creator, who…

Gives life to the dead and calls into existence things that don’t yet exist.  Romans 4:17

Tetelestai Recovery Volume 2, Chapter 2 – Wake the Dead https://a.co/d/6JPl2Lf

A Date With Destiny

True Value

lastwordrecovery

Ecclesiastes 7:12

But wisdom is better than money because it can save a person’s life.

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Your life is much too valuable to waste time worrying about money.  God has promised to take care of your needs as you take care of His.

The value of your life is very precious. God designed you in a unique way so as to provide you with the proper skills and wisdom you need in order to accomplish the assignments He selected just for you.

Wisdom comes to you in many forms. Sometimes it comes to you through dreams, songs, support groups, and bible studies. Sometimes you gain it through conversations with family and friends. 

You see the true value of life from a spiritual perspective. You see treasures of the Divine sprinkled over the earth’s canvas in colorful wildflowers, spectacular sunsets, and twinkling night skies.

You enjoy the simple things of life. The basic necessities of food and drink are never taken for granted nor their preparation treated as drudgery. You do not worry for these basic needs, but rather, you celebrate them as gifts from God.

You believe the bountiful blessings God has given are meant to be shared with others. You have a warm and generous heart. 

You know that life is more important than mere possessions. The true value of life far exceeds the things which can only be measured by human currency.

Your presence on this planet is being developed into a remarkable blend of generosity, wisdom, and integrity.

As God carefully molds you into the image of His Son, you are being transformed into a wise and wonderful human being.

https://a.co/d/6uAjdSi

Tetelestai Recovery

A Clear View

lastwordrecovery

They arrived in Bethsaida. Some people brought a sightless man and begged Jesus to give him a healing touch. Taking him by the hand, he led him out of the village. He put spit in the man’s eyes, laid hands on him, and asked, “Do you see anything?”

He looked up. “I see men. They look like walking trees.” So, Jesus laid hands on his eyes again. The man looked hard and realized that he had recovered perfect sight; saw everything in bright, twenty-twenty focus.

Jesus sent him straight home, telling him, “Don’t enter the village.” 

Mark 8:22-26

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Like the blind man in this passage, we needed a second touch from Jesus to heal our distorted view. All we had to do was be honest and admit that our perspective was still distorted. Jesus didn’t scold the man for not having enough faith, or for being inadequate. Jesus simply asked him what was wrong and then fixed it.

At the end of the story, after the man’s vision was perfectly restored, Jesus told him to go straight home and not to go back into the village.  In our own parallel stories, we heard Jesus say, “Don’t go back into….”

We each heard a different ending to that sentence, based on our own uniquely personal experience. For all of us, it was a moment of truth. If we wanted to enjoy our total Tetelestai Recovery and be comfortable in our New Normal, we would not be able to return to that person, place, or thing which was certain to pull us back into our distortions.

Tetelestai Recovery Volume 2, Chapter Four, A Clear View https://a.co/d/49qBC5V

Tetelestai Recovery

Tetelestai

lastwordrecovery

In the original Greek language, the word for the phrase “It is finished” is Tetelestai.

I was introduced to the word Tetelestai one day when I was well into my fourth year of permanent healing from addiction.

It was during a year-long court battle which had been a residual consequence from my old life. The day I appeared in court to hear the verdict and receive my sentence, I claimed this scripture and the word Tetelestai over my case.  I was relieved by the peace it held and became willing to accept whatever God had in store for me, even if it meant a year in prison.

I prayed this scripture and acknowledged the fact that God had already redeemed me. He had made me a new creation by healing me from addiction. As I was praying that morning, God was working on the judge.  He gave the judge an insight into something that no one else had seen…

Tetelestai Recovery Volume 2, Introduction https://a.co/d/0lhAU5G

Tetelestai Recovery

The Great Exchange

lastwordrecovery

The work of Christ was miraculous and supernatural. His wholeness could not be explained or understood. What was broken became whole and what was missing began to appear. The void was no longer an empty vacuum demanding to be filled. We had living water to relieve the spiritual thirst which once drove us to the bottle. We derived pleasure and relief from the intoxication of the Holy Spirit which far exceeded the effects and duration of our former chemical concoctions.

As we received this shalom of our Savior and trusted that He refused to leave us broken or misplaced, we understood that this was what scripture defines as the gift of salvation.

We are not the broken people we once were. We need not fear that anyone will discover our inadequacies, for we have everything that we need. The proof is not always there, but the truth is. We bring our faith and our doubts to Him, and in return, He offers us shalom.

We enter a new realm of confidence in Christ. To our brokenness and emptiness, a strong clear voice declares from the cross and echoes into our void, “Tetelestai!”

Tetelestai Recovery, Chapter 6 Shalom https://a.co/d/fa0vnYg

Tetelestai Recovery

Marc’s Story

lastwordrecovery

I was born into a two-parent alcoholic home and struggled for decades with drug and alcohol dependence. I started drinking as a small child and was a daily drug user by age twelve. I was blessed with a willfully strong intellect and despite my addiction issues, went to college, started a family, and became a successful entrepreneur. By age twenty-six, my occasional, yet increasingly frequent business, relationship, and legal problems caused me to seek relief from my struggle with drugs and alcohol.

I had an intellectual concept of a spiritual energy (Higher Power) and over the next twenty-seven years, I cycled in and out of sobriety, with the assistance of 12-step recovery meetings and multiple treatment institutions. In that twenty-seven-year period I worked steps, had sponsors and sponsees, attended meetings, worked service jobs and attended counseling. Despite what some would say was a strong recovery program, I continued to relapse with multiple auto wrecks, work accidents, play injuries, DUI’s, loss of relationships, divorce, and spiritual discourse. Consequences continued to mount and got more severe. I agonized over what I was doing wrong and often asked myself, “Why can’t I seem to get it? Why can’t I stay clean and sober?”

Bouncing from program to program I became active in four different 12-step programs and had a daily ritual of meetings to attend. I continued to relapse again and again over resentments, old acquaintances, the “disease”, and the never-ending discussions and excitement about the glory of the ‘good ole days’. My angst would grow until I would try a different drug or go back to my good old friend alcohol.

Faith in God or my version of a Higher Power, became shaken, questioned, and eventually dismissed.

Tetelestai Recovery, Chapter 7, Marc’s Story https://a.co/d/31zY36e