Another Reason Christians Resort to Twelve Steps

I think of that wonderful Christian poster "Footprints".

There are times in our life when we see two sets of footprints, convinced that we are walking with Jesus and following God.

Then at some points in the road, we see only one set of footprints.

At first we get angry, even fearful, and then Jesus lovingly responds:

"During those times, I was carrying you."

We need to accept that Jesus wants to carry us all the time, and in fact He has prepared everything so that He can carry us.

Yet there are areas in our lives where we have not been ready to give up control, such as our married lives, or our relationships with other people, or our jobs, our money, or any other area.

God wants us to rest in His Son for everything (Matthew 11: 28-30) since He is our life (Colossians 3:4), and His number one desire is that we prosper and have health, even as our soul prospers (3 John 2)

We have a hard time trusting Him because we do not see Him big enough to handle everything in our lives.

There is precisely the problem. We do not trust Him because our understanding of how great He is just too small.

But why?

Because we are not established in His righteousness:

"14In righteousness shalt thou be established: thou shalt be far from oppression; for thou shalt not fear: and from terror; for it shall not come near thee." (Isaiah 54: 14)

Jesus made it very clear: His Kingdom and His righteousness are essential before anything else in our lives:

"33But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." (Matthew 6: 33)

The rest shall be added unto us.

How do we get this righteousness? Isaiah gives us a clue, certainly:

"17No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD." (Isaiah 54: 17)

We receive His righteousness, not our own.

Yet still, how?

"For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." (2 Corinthians 5: 21)

and also

"King James Version
For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ." (Romans 5:17)

We simply receive the gift of righteousness be grace through faith. As for entering His Kingdom, we receive the same as a gift:

"Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." (Luke 12: 32)

and then

"[God] hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son" (Colossians 1:13)

Our job is to rest and receive that we saved by Jesus' work at the Cross, that through Him we have been taken from dead in our trespasses to alive and seated above the heavens in Christ (Ephesians 2: 4-8)

We receive a new standing, a new life, we have been made a new creation (2 Corinthians 5: 17)

Instead of doing more, we need to believe more, as we grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord (2 Peter 3: 18)

If we do not rest in the finality of the Cross, that our righteousness has nothing - nothing! - to do with us, but everything to do with what Jesus has done, then we frustrate the grace of God in our lives (Galatians 2: 21; 5: 4).

In fact, our knowledge of the Lord is based on resting in the truth that He remembers our sins no more (Hebrews 8: 10-12)

Christians who insist on working the Twelve Steps, because they believe that they have to perfect themselves, even though we are perfected forever in Christ (Hebrews 10: 14) will find themselves unable to believe God for anything else. We need His righteousness and His alone, and we cannot get this righteousness except by receiving it as a gift.

Until Christians understand that Jesus has done everything, and thus we receive all things through Him (Romans 8: 31-32) because of what He did for us at the Cross, Christians will still operate under the false notion that they have to do the work and live the life, and thus will seek out the works and ways of men, such as Alcoholics Anonymous, Celebrate Recovery, and other Twelve Step cults.