12 Steps And A Sick Church

I had a discussion with my son and mentioned that the 12 Steps of A.A. were something that every church should take a good, hard look at. He told me, "the Church is sick". I agree. The 12 Steps of A.A. mirror the truth of God's Word. Step 1: Admit our powerlessness over our sinful nature and the inability to manage our own lives (this is paraphrased). Step 2. Believe that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity (or, as in the case of the Church, "save us" from our sin and ourselves. Step 3: Make a decision to turn our lives and our will over the the care of God. In the case of A.A. it's "God as we understand Him/Her/It". As Christians we seem to be able to get through the first two just fine. And then, as we turn our lives over to Christ we bog down on the "will" part. We don't surrender our "will", we just are happy to be "saved and on our way to heaven". In A.A. there is a saying that one has to "reach their bottom" in order to see their true need for intervention. I have found that, in a lot of ways, those in A.A. have a better understanding of "surrendering the will" than those in the Church of Jesus Christ. This enables those in secular "spiritual" groups to continue on in the journey....to make a fearless and searching moral inventory of their lives, admit to God AND another human being the exact nature of their wrongs, to make amends to people they have hurt,... to carry the message of experience, strength and hope to others, etc. The Spiritual live is indeed a "journey", a succession of "steps", if you will. The Church would be wise to take a cue from A.A., N.A., or any of the various recovery groups and live up to what the Bible has been teaching from the beginning....total surrender, examining our lives in the light of God's word, the dire need for fellowship and the gratitude to the saving Grace of Jesus' death, resurrection and forgiveness which enables us to "carry the message" to those who are still hurting and suffering.