Recovery Journeys:
Releasing into Freedom
Seventh Sunday After Pentecost ● July 7, 2024
Pastor Alexis Lillie © 2024
You can view the full worship video recording at:
https://youtu.be/bahs5hpWT2c?si=KO7HmadNC0HYJ1vl
Scripture Readings:
Luke 4:18-19 (The Message)
The reading text is provided at the end of this sermon.
iStock Image #1135514476, by Khlongwangchao, Used by permission.jpg
I want to name something before we start: I don't have personal experience with 12 Step recovery programs specifically, so it feels a little awkward to be preaching this first Sunday of our new series on 12 Step spirituality. However, as Richard Rohr says in his book, Breathing Underwater, about 12-step spirituality: we are all addicted to something, we are all in recovery from something. Some of those things are maybe more or less culturally "appropriate" or even encouraged (I think of things like workaholism, addiction to perfection, or busy-ness, some of which are almost held up as aspirational by our culture).
We all have areas of hurt or suffering that, left to our own devices, we try to placate in unhealthy ways. Understood this way, I can certainly identify with journeys of recovery - and the things we do to try to avoid these journeys!
And, to be quite honest, I don't like the key word we find in this first step ... "powerless." Colby touched on this in his reflection, and helpfully offered another angle to look at this first step. And, as I talked this week with folks in our community who are in 12-step programs, I broadened my perspective on this step, and this word. For one thing, it's not saying we are powerless in all areas of our life! But rather naming that there are certain things that have power over us in ways other things do not! One rather silly – but still very real! – example I thought of is when I get stressed, I'm not tempted to eat too much kale salad or vegetables!! I have much more difficulty when it comes to breads and chocolates!!
I also learned from talking to folks in recovery groups, there are some recovery groups that intentionally chose not to use this word because of the ways it can trigger responses for folks that have experienced different types of trauma.
For some, insisting on maintaining the word "powerless" is more a letter-of-the-law vs. spirit-of-the-law decision. That at the point of inception of 12 Step programs, perhaps this was a helpful idea, but the word itself -- as we've learned more about cognition and psychology and genetics -- has maybe become a hindrance instead of a help. And that for some it's more about sticking to the message undergirding this step than clinging to the exact words.
This resonates for me. The word "powerless" when thinking about healing from addiction or suffering doesn't really work for me. But. and perhaps this is just semantics, but I can definitely get on board with the idea that control -- our power -- is an illusion, and buying in to it has caused me harm on my journey to healing. Attempting to control the things I was unhealed from actually kept me obsessed -- addicted -- with those things. Attempting to push down my areas of dis-ease meant that actually my inner wounds were occupying much of my energy, yet they were what I was trying to escape!!
Isn't that cycle a paradox: in my attempt at control, things were in fact becoming overwhelming. These very things that I was trying to control. What I heard in conversations with some of you this week is that no matter our addictions, no matter what we need healing from understanding powerlessness through this lens -- the lens of letting go of what we're trying to control -- can actually be freeing!!
Our text today reminds us that Jesus' mission on earth is to bring this freedom - through release and recovery.
He's going back into ancient Hebrew scriptures quoting the prophet Isaiah -- giving new life to words that would have been familiar to his Jewish audience.
And we in 21st century progressive Christianity love these words too!
They get thrown around a lot -- we like to apply them to a lot of different areas.
I think partly because we want to be part of a movement that does all these things!!
These words percolated in the Jewish tradition for centuries ... they're certainly not quick fixes of short-term promises.
It would be nice if we could just wave a magic wand and have it be so ...
instead of paradoxes, and the folly of control, and prisons of our own making ...
we could have release, and recovery, and freedom.
Well ... we aren't part of a movement based on a fairy god mother ...
We are part of a movement that invites us to join Jesus in this quest ... which requires HARD WORK (I know. Super fun. ;))
If this release and recovery is part of Jesus' mission ... he spends a lot of his life helping people surface and name the pieces of themselves they're trying to control, so they can actually access this release and recovery he's offering .... by getting out of that cycle.
We've talked about some of these recently -- think about the story of the woman at the well, who is able to tell her difficult truth to Jesus.
Or of Lazarus, who is called from death to life.
Think of the story of Zacchaeus - who is ostracized by his Jewish community for being a tool of empire, but who Jesus sees for who he is -- both the truth of his profession, and the core of his being.
Jesus is living out his mission of release and recovery by helping people surface stuff so that they can actually recover from it!!
By taking off those tendencies to push down in order to (try to) control.
We cannot heal what is unnamed.
IV. The Root
There is a freedom in the "powerlessness" of realizing we can't keep doing the same thing and expecting different results.
We can't stay caught in a cycle that keeps us un-healed from our addictions, whatever those are for us.
It is scary to step into the unknown of healing -- because it is work, and it's not easy (to understate the obvious ...)
But at a certain point, that unknown is better than continuing to do the things that are catching us in our cycles of suffering.
A perfect example for me is the decision I made a number of years ago to release my marriage relationship.
We struggled in it for so long, wanting so much to make it all work ...
And even as we worked hard on ourselves and our relationship, we seemed to be caught in an inescapable cycle of slipping into old patterns and hurting one another.
And finally I had to lean into the powerlessness of that struggle and just ... let it go.
I had to admit that I was doing the same thing over and over, and expecting different results.
That even though what I was stepping into was hard and completely unknown, it had to be better than what I was leaving behind.
I don't purport that divorce is the same as addiction ... or that letting go of a difficult relationship is always the right choice.
But a decision that moves us more into wholeness and healing ... away from our disregulated patterns ... that (from my conversations with you all and my evolving understanding of the 12-step process) seems to be the spirit of the first step.
And it is the spirit of Jesus' stated life mission in our text today: Freedom through recovery and release.
In our journeys of recovery -- no matter our addictions, and what we are recovering from -- Jesus calls us to release the cycles that keep us locked in a desire for control ... and let what is unhealed surface so that we can find the freedom that comes in naming and healing it.
Luke 4:18-19 (The Message)
A reading from the Gospel as recorded by Luke.
Jesus reads a passage from the writing of the prophet Isaiah
at the synagogue in his home town of Nazareth,
“The Spirit of our God is upon me:
because the Most High has anointed me
to bring Good News to those who are poor.
God has sent me to proclaim liberty to those held captive
recovery of sight to those who cannot see,
and release to those in prison—
to proclaim the year of God’s favor.”
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The first step of Alcoholic Anonymous:
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—
that our lives had become unmanageable.
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Friends, these are words of Life and Freedom
Thanks be to God