Tetelestai Recovery

Finding Strength Through Divine Justice


Exodus 3:20…”I will use my great power against your oppressors. I will make miracles happen in that land.”

The Lord cares deeply about you. He sees that some of the things you go through are unfair, but He always brings you through them and into a position of power.

You sense God’s presence with greater intensity during times when your burden seems too heavy to carry alone.  Because of this, you can be grateful for your struggles, because they generate a new level of intimacy between you and your Creator.

Knowing that God does what is right, you have come to rely on His justice. You do not hesitate to ask Him for a judgment call any time you see a violation of what is honest, fair, and right.

Because you know God is just and will help you carry the heaviness you feel after having been wronged, you are able to move easily into forgiveness where freedom is found. 

Assured that the Creator of the Universe is interested in what happens to those who are harmed by human injustices, you remain alert to any violation of basic human rights.

God promises to hand down a ruling that is just, bringing integrity where there was once corruption; and equality where there was once disparity.

You know that you are called to speak for those who have no voice. You feel impassioned to stand up for those who are held in bondage by prejudice and inequity. You reject any ideology which promotes bigotry or derision.

You often cry out to God about this particular aspect of the human condition. You pursue all remedies available to eliminate its ugly presence in society.

In answer to your passionate prayers, the Commander of Angel Armies is empowering other individuals who will help you advance this cause and shed light on the social injustices which have plagued society for centuries.

No human will be able to stand against His plan. Justice will be served. Honor will be given where honor is due.

Tetelestai Recovery

From Relief to Despair: The Costs of Emotional Dependency

The presence of unwanted feelings such as insecurity, inadequacy, fear, anger, and other social phobias, coupled with our inability to manage or control them, unleashed within us a desperation for relief at any cost. We soon learned of a temporary reprieve that occurred when our brain chemistry became altered. We didn’t care that the relief would be short lived or cause irreparable damage. The long-awaited relief of rightness, contrasted against the life-long agony of wrongness, offered such an enchanting embrace, we surrendered without a fight.

When our minds were not altered, we fell into total despair. Sadly, these moments of disparity began to seep into every moment, and the relief withdrew as quickly as it came.

We became slaves to our feelings. We tested the quality of our product by the way it made us feel. We watched for warning signs of overdose by the way our bodies felt. We discovered ways to get out of responsibilities by saying, β€œI don’t feel well.” We made all sorts of excuses to ourselves and to others, based on our feelings. We accused our dealer of cutting because his product didn’t make us feel the way we wanted, or the way it used to. We sank into despair when the supply ran out. We drove through blizzards, walked through storms, and did whatever necessary to get the substance that would make us feel right. We went without sleep, food, and basic necessities. We lost relationships and emptied bank accounts in a mad pursuit of a feeling we wanted to feel.

We were caught in a cycle of frenzied flight. Running from feelings we couldn’t stand. Searching for a feeling we thought we knew. We didn’t like to feel wrong, and we didn’t know how to feel right…

Tetelestai Recovery

Renewed Identity in Christ: From Regret to Redemption

We began to thank God for His provision even when we felt needy: Β 

The Lord is the Spirit,Β and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 2 Corinthians 3:17

We believed God for His righteousness even when we felt wrong. We believed in ourselves as new creations even when we felt damaged. We stopped living in regret, even when we felt as if we should.

We no longer identified with who we were, but rather, we identified ourselves as who we became at the moment, we began our Tetelestai Revolution. We had come to know love that we had never known before. We had received a personal pardon from the King of Kings and according to Ephesians 3:19, we were becoming filled with the fullness of God, which was gradually squeezing out our tendency to be full of ourselves.

Tetelestai Recovery

Embracing Spiritual Transformation: A New Life in Christ

We realized we were no longer addicted, damaged, and dysfunctional. We sensed that our bodies, souls, and spirits were coming into harmony with our divine destiny. As the light seeped into where darkness had been, we saw things we’d never seen before. We understood spiritual concepts that had seemed confusing in the past.

As we opened our minds to sacred text, the revolution began. We discovered new parameters for our belief system.

I Corinthians 2:16 stated, β€œWe understand these things, for we have the mind of Christ,” so we released our mental constraints and became aware of our new understanding.

2 Corinthians 5:17 told us that β€œanyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”

Therefore, we resisted the temptation to dwell on the past. We had become a new creation in Christ, so there was no past to lament.

Tetelestai Recovery

Mastering Emotions That Control Us: A Biblical Perspective

We know that our emotions can be a powerful force that affects us, body, mind, and soul. We also know that Jesus has made a way to escape being controlled by our feelings, which can range from pesky to obsessive or even frightening. We are told in the Word that we have been made the righteousness of God in Christ. This flies in the face of feelings that indicate something is wrong with us. Our feelings are no match for the Word of God. If the Creator of the Universe says we are righteous, then our emotions have no right to dispute it.

We have been made right by the blood of Christ which was donated as a divine transfusion to heal us from the inside out. The emotions we feel, the sounds we hear, the words we say, and the images we see, must all defer to the words of our King who has decreed tetelestai over all that is wrong with us…

Tetelestai Recovery

Idolatry of Emotions: Claiming Righteousness Through Grace

When we discovered the power of Jesus’ declaration, β€œIt is finished,” we claimed tetelestai over our misaligned compass comprised of human emotion.

We stopped worshipping at the feet of our feelings and ditched them at the foot of the cross. We learned that our feelings were an unpredictable deity. We saw that exalting our feelings to a place of devotion, was nothing short of idolatry.

We made a firm decision to discover God’s thoughts of us, rather than our own thoughts of ourselves.

We didn’t feel like believing in our rightness, but the Word stated we were the righteousness (right-ness) of God. We were much more comfortable feeling wrong and running from it. We were unsure how to settle into knowing, rather than feeling.

It didn’t feel right to believe right, but once we got a revelation of grace, and stopped relying on how bad we felt, we discovered a sense of stability we’d never known before.

Tetelestai Recovery

What Tetelestai Really Means: Beyond “It Is Finished”

We noticed that Jesus’ final word tetelestai, translated into the English phrase, it is finished, seemed to imply a sense of giving up. We found this to be an unfortunate language barrier. As it turns out, in the original Greek language of the New Testament, this word tetelestai is a declaration of victory, completion, and success.

Tetelestai is the comment an artist might whisper after completing his final brush stroke on a masterpiece.

Tetelestai is the report a soldier would bring to his commanding officer when a battle was over, and victory had been secured.

We believe our Savior used His final breath on the cross to declare for all time, to all creation, in every dimension, that there is nothing left undone: It is finished; Tetelestai.

There is no more drudgery to sobriety and no more anguish to recovery. There is no self-effort which must be added to what has been declared, Tetelestai.

IT IS FINISHED

Tetelestai Recovery

Overcoming Substance Addiction: The Gift of Tetelestai

In matters of our recovery from substance addiction and the mental dysfunction that accompanies it, we were completely helpless. We had no thoughts that could heal our thoughts. We had no disclosure that could remove our secret shame. We had no detour that would lead us out of the darkness. We were lost. We were alone. We were afraid.

But suddenly, in a random, unexplainable moment, the gift of Tetelestai was revealed. We had run out of options, yet in that barren wasteland of emptiness, we stumbled upon a treasure trove of truth.

Tetelestai Recovery

The Insanity of Addiction: A Journey to Mental Freedom

There is an overpowering conflict that occurs within the mind of anyone who has encountered the desperation of addiction. The struggle to escape one’s own mind by flooding it with toxic levels of mood-altering chemicals is the true definition of insanity. Yet many of us suffered from this fatal and debilitating disease, consenting to the madness as if there were no other option.

In search of total recovery, we discovered we were not only seeking to be delivered from our dependency on mind or mood-altering substances, but we also searched for freedom from our thought processes, our twisted perceptions, and our obsessive fears.

In this emotional state of chronic crisis, we were exhausted.

We struggled to be free from a mind that plotted its own demise. Our thoughts quite literally tormented us to the point of insanity. We needed a way to manage our feelings and silence our sickness…

Tetelestai Recovery

Breaking Free: Addressing Addictions Beyond Drugs

We concluded that all humans suffer from at least one type of addiction. However, we also know that every addiction can be called out and destroyed, using the pronouncement of Jesus, β€œTetelestai” (It is finished).

Last Word Recovery Ministries developed the Tetelestai Recovery program that is based on the power of Jesus declaration which offers the possibility of permanent freedom for anyone struggling with addiction.

 As the ripple effect of this program began to reach the families and friends of those who were enjoying permanent sobriety, we received requests for an expanded version of the program which could address other destructive addictions and dysfunctions beyond the scope of drug or alcohol dependence. We were intrigued by this idea and excited to pursue it. 

In this third volume, Tetelestai Recovery – Leveling Up, we address some non-drug addictions, along with other dysfunctional behaviors related to the human condition. We offer Sacred Text selections that can break these strongholds and prevent further harm.

Tetelestai Recovery is not just for addicts. It is for everyone. Jesus says, β€œIt is finished!” to the behaviors and dysfunctions that weigh us down and hold us back.