Twelve Steps; Step 5 – when an addict or an abuser repents

Rare is it that we see someone with serious pathological shortcomings (sin!) come before God and another human being to confess it all.  Much more is it the case that an addict or an abuser would continue their journey of denial and bargaining and inward anger to deny those they’d harmed their justice.

But not with those who have embarked on a Step 4 “fearless moral inventory”.

This is where the Twelve Steps come into their own; each and every step the power of God for purification and transformation in the life of the one in recovery as well as justice and vindication for the ones harmed.

Step 4, when done well — usually an exhaustive process of prayer, journalling and recording, and much pondering and curating, based on the seven deadly sins — a period of time conjoined by both peace and agony, where we stay with the log in our own eye — is the launching pad to probably the most courageous thing any of us mired in our sin can do.

That’s Step 5 — to sit and confess every shameful deed dredged up before God and another human being.

Every deed that has long been buried in denial, shame, guilt, self-hatred and anger turned in upon oneself, which always spills out through transference onto innocent others.

The process takes hours.  It took me five hours on December 14, 2003.  And today I had the privilege of supervising someone complete their Step 5 — a final and official three-hour block that built on several hours of previous deep Step 5 work over a few months.  The courage that has consistently been shown by this one in their recovery is nothing short of miraculous.  The hope they give to those they have transgressed is built upon the pillars of justice and peace.

There was such a sense of achievement as we travelled together for 180 minutes of deep confession, affirmation, clarification, challenge, courage and commissioning.

The full Step 5 experience is laden with weeks of intercessory prayer beforehand, it has the Holy Spirit’s presence and anointing, and it is the ripping open of a new heart, cleansed, refreshed and made anew, restored in the holiness of Jesus’ name.

In this one today was the pleasure of Almighty God, a Lord who cannot despise a broken and contrite heart facing the full measure of their once destructive truth.

Survivors of abuse live and breathe in the hope that their perpetrators would one day face the truth of the despicable things that they did to them.  If only they did, they would just about without exception be forgiven.  But regretfully so few do.

The is why the Twelve Step program is the power of God for change, restoration for the sinner, justice for the abused, glorifying for our Lord.

Lord Jesus,

In the powers of Your grace, and by faith that pleases You, we ask for the sake of the sinner who has impacted the lives of those You love, that You, by Your Spirit, would convict their heart to acknowledge, to admit, and to address their sin.  Cause these ones who are still prodigals to You to turn back to You for their own eternal sake.  Cause them to have courage that, through honesty and courage, they might execute justice and vindication for the ones they’ve harmed before they go to meet You. Help them to know the way to Your peace, which is to worship You in spirit and in truth, to know that You are a relational God who desires all sinful harm to be reconciled.

AMEN.