SHAM Reveals So Much More

 SHAM: How the Self-Help Movement Made American Helpless

Steve Salerno's book has been quite a helpful book.

He reveals how a modern matnra  of "self-improvement" has done anything but.

Just like a frustrated OCD patient with dirt on his hands will continue to clean himself, and only make himself dirtier, so too men and women in the world, whether born again or not, continue running to self-help books to break themselves free of their problems, as if the next guru, the next spiritual program, the guide on weight loss or relationships, will break them out of their frustrated, empty lives.

Mankind is empty because they have removed God, they do not understand the riches and the fullness of all that He is.

They have not look on the Savior, to see a loving God who wants to provide all things, who wants us to take our eyes off ourselves and place them on Himself.

On Him who has been from the beginning:

"12I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake. 13I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one. I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the Father. 14I have written unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." (1 JOhn 2: 12-14)

We need ot know that all our sins are forgiven. All our imperfections are taken care of, too, paid for at the Cross. This truth is much needed in our world today, where replacing God with ourselves has created a culture of men and women who do not grow up, who believe that everything is about them, and finding that they do not measure up (or that life is rather dissatisfying) they spend their lives trying to improve themselves or their circumstances, as if all of these things will make them feel better.

Oh, that mantra "feel better" -- how that has contributed to make us feel all the worse!

We do not need to feel better. We need to know and believe the following:

Fathers - who know Jesus, who has been from the beginning, the source of life, the beginning and the end of all things. Strictly speaking, when we understand fully that life is not about us, but about Him, then we have His Life, and that more abundantly!

Now, what does a discussion about SHAM -- Self-Help and Actualization Movements -- have to do with Alcoholics Anonymous?

Too much which has not been revealed.

At its core, Alcoholics Anonymous is all about teaching people that they can progress from their illness, which also defines them, and have something better today compared to what they did yesterday.

A program which points out that self is our biggest problem, at the same time aggravates self by pushing self-improvement, even though the Twelve Steps allege that there is some Higher Power which is helping us.

We do not need a Higher Power to help us. We need the Highest Power, who is all things, and works in and through us.

We need to know this God as Father, we need ot know that through HIm we have overcome all dangers and upsets. We also need to understand that Jesus, the only Son and very image of God the Father, holds all things together.

And He loves us! Wow! He loves us!

This love cannot be communicated through our own conception, and requires us to stop looking at ourselves and start paying attention to His payment for us.