My Hidden Heart

God can’t heal what I keep hidden.

When I finally let Him search my heart, He set me free.

God, I invite your searching gaze into my heart. Examine me through and through; find out everything that may be hidden within me. Psalm 139:23

“Sounds like you hate your dad?” my sponsor said to me one day when we were doing step work.

I quickly responded, “No I don’t. I don’t hate anybody!”

He grinned and said, “Okay, that’s just what it sounds like to me.”

I pushed back, “No! I don’t!”

“Well, that’s good,” he said, smiling. “Then it shouldn’t be too hard to write about. Let’s do that.”

“Okay, I will,” I said, respectfully defiant, (if there is such a thing).

So we stopped what we were working on, and I began a Fourth Step on my dad. It went on for several weeks, but it felt like forever. (That should have been a clue for me; denial, how great is thy sting.) Then one night as I was sharing about something that happened when I was a kid, I heard myself say, “Man, I hated him for that.”

My sponsor’s eyebrows raised ever so slightly. He gave me a gentle but intent look that said, “Did you hear what you just said?” I froze mid-sentence, the silence was deafening, he leaned in gently and asked, “You heard what you said, huh?”

“Yeah, I did,” I said quietly. I continued, bewildered, “But, I don’t hate… anybody? I love God and I have love for everyone.”

He saw the confusion on my face, nodded, and gently asked if I wanted to talk about it. A weight lifted off me that night, like a five-ton stone sliding off my heart.

I’m so grateful I had a sponsor who listened to my pain and not just my words. He heard what I was unaware of and unwilling to admit. I really did hate my dad, but I had covered over it with “Christian love.” I had been taught in church and read from the Bible that we are to love everyone and not hate anyone. Because of that, I denied the hatred in my heart since I wasn’t supposed to feel it. That night I saw how important it is to look at what is, not how I want things to be. I didn’t want to hate, but I did.

Working the steps, even the ones not written in the books; you know, the ones your sponsor tells you to do, has brought me freedom, peace, and love. Facing the truth freed me from hidden hatred and fear. After that night, I no longer hated my dad. I let it go. It lost its power over me, and my Fourth Step on him ended that same evening. God used my sponsor to show me what needed to be healed, and I’m thankful for His grace.

𝗣𝗿𝗮𝘆𝗲𝗿:

God, thank You for loving me enough to reveal what I’ve hidden, even from myself. Search my heart today and bring to light anything that stands between me and Your peace. Help me face truth with honesty and humility, and thank You for replacing my fear with freedom. Amen.

How Recovery Brought Me Back to God

A story of honesty, healing, and rediscovering grace.

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. James 4:8

Recovery did not just help me stop self destructive behavior. It helped me rediscover who God really is. The story of how that happened is where this devotional begins.

When I first came into recovery, I was hiding from God. I had known God closely once and never stopped believing in Him, but I wanted nothing to do with church or religion. I did not want to be preached at or told what I should be doing. I felt I had drifted too far away, was now too broken, and too ashamed to face Him again.

I avoided churches of any kind, yet it seemed like most recovery meetings were held in one, and I avoided those too.

Attending my first Christ centered recovery group happened completely by accident. Or did it. I do not believe in coincidences.

I had gone to my regular Friday night meeting, but when I arrived, no one was there. I walked up and down the empty halls of the school, checking classrooms and even interrupting another meeting by mistake. I called everyone I knew, and finally someone told me there was no meeting that night.

I was crushed. I needed a meeting. It had been a rough day, and the thought of being alone that night was unbearable. I was scared.

As I sat there in my car, desperate for connection, I remembered that sign at the church.

Sitting there, uneasy feelings of rejection and being unloved began to surface. I thought about that sign in front of the church that I drove past on my way to my meeting. It seemed to jump out at me that night and catch my attention.

It said Celebrate Recovery. It sounded like a meeting, but it was still in a church, and that did not feel safe. Did I mention I used to attend that church. Yeah. Talk about insult to injury.

Every time I drove past it, I told myself, “That’s not for me.”

But that night something felt different. I did not want to go home, and I did not want to be alone. I knew the meeting was already well underway and probably almost over, but I had enough recovery to know that some meeting was better than no meeting.

So I decided to take a chance.

The sign said it started at seven. I walked in around seven forty five, and the meeting was still going and just breaking into share groups.

This was different. It was a welcome change.

A man named Jeff greeted me like he had been waiting for me to arrive. He asked my name and what brought me there. I was caught off guard. It felt personal to be asked that directly, but as I later learned, that is recovery in action.

I told him I was just looking for a meeting, and he smiled and said, “You found one.”

That night marked the beginning of something I never expected. A renewed connection with God.

He was bringing me back to Him slowly and at my pace, even though I had done everything I could to keep Him at arm’s distance.

I felt like the prodigal son being welcomed home. For the first time in a long time, something inside me stirred. It was hope.

It did not take long for me to realize something was happening that I could not fully explain. I was not just going to meetings anymore. I was starting to open up.

Each time I shared honestly, something inside me loosened.

The walls I had built to protect myself were starting to come down. I began to sense God’s presence again. I started to feel like it might be safe to trust these people.

An experience I had as a teenager convinced me that trusting church people with my struggles and fears was impossible. But the people in recovery did not judge me or preach at me. They listened. They understood. They cared.

In their acceptance, I began to see God’s grace in practice.

Recovery was doing what religion never could. It was teaching me how to be honest, how to trust, how to connect, and how to belong again.

Somewhere in that process, I realized that God had not given up on me. He had been waiting there the whole time for me to humble myself, let go of my resentments, and surrender to His will.

As I followed the suggestion to keep coming back, I noticed these meetings had three parts. There was a time of worship and giving thanks to God, a time of teaching or testimony, and then the share groups.

The share groups were familiar to me from other recovery meetings, so that is where I started. Once I understood the structure, I began arriving just in time for them, and that was okay. No one looked down on me or made me feel different. I was accepted just as I was.

After a while, I started showing up right after the worship so I could hear the teaching on one of the steps or listen to someone share their story. Jeff, the man who greeted me that first night, became my sponsor.

He encouraged me, which is a nice way of saying he told me, that it was time to stop running from God. He invited me to attend the whole meeting, including the worship. I reluctantly agreed. I am so glad I did.

Through those moments of worship, something came alive in me again. God was meeting me where I was and gently leading me home. I started to feel grateful.

I did not realize it at the time, but each small step I took toward honesty, connection, and openness was also a step toward God. I had been running from Him for so long, but through recovery He patiently waited for me to come back.

The verse says, Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. James 4:8.

For years, I thought that meant I had to clean myself up first. What I really had to do was show up. One honest step in His direction. God did the rest.

Looking back now, I can see that recovery did not just bring me healing. It brought me back to God. It brought me home.

My relationship with God is no longer based on performance. It is based on understanding that He accepts me just as I am. I began to see that in the rooms of recovery, and it helped me understand that God accepts me, listens to me, and loves me, imperfections and all.

This devotional was written from that place. From the heart of someone who discovered that healing is not just about recovery, but about relationship. My prayer is that as you read these reflections, you experience the same grace that brought me home.

The Real Reason I Was Upset

When God Showed Me the Hurt Beneath the Reaction

Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.
Psalm 139:23

We had been holding our Christ-centered recovery meetings at our church for about six months, after nearly a year of prayer, preparation, and leadership training. My wife and I had invested our time, energy, and hearts into getting it started. The meetings were thriving, with more than fifty people attending each week.

Then one afternoon, the pastor called to tell me we could no longer use the fellowship hall where we held our meal time. His son had started using the room for a business gathering. I was stunned. The meal time was such an important part of what we did – it was where newcomers met others, developed relationships, and connected with potential sponsors. I couldn’t believe that after all that effort, we were being displaced for a sales meeting.

Frustrated and angry, I called my sponsor. I explained what happened and how unfair it felt. He listened and then asked, “Why are you so upset?”

“I just told you,” I said, “They took our room from us!”

He asked again, more pointedly, “Why are you so upset?”

I repeated my reasons, still irritated. Then he said something that stopped me cold. “Which one of your core issues is being stirred up by this situation?”

I paused. In that moment, I knew exactly what he meant. I wasn’t just angry about losing a room. I felt rejected, overlooked, and unimportant. It touched old wounds of not feeling good enough or chosen. The truth was, those feelings were my issue, not anyone else’s.

My sponsor encouraged me to look at it differently. “Either the other group will take off and need a bigger space, or it will fade away. Either way, you’ll most likely get your room back.”

So we moved our meal time into the sanctuary. It meant more set-up and clean-up, but we made it work. And just as he said, within two weeks the other meetings faded and we got our fellowship hall back. But the real victory wasn’t getting the room back. It was learning to pause, look inward, and let God deal with the root instead of the reaction.

Prayer:

Lord, when I feel angry, overlooked, or rejected, help me to stop and ask what You are showing me. Teach me to take inventory of my heart and to let You heal the places where I still feel not good enough. Thank You for using every circumstance, even the unexpected ones, to draw me closer to You. Amen.

Living Amends

Letting go of yesterday by living differently today.

We know that our old life died with Christ on the cross so that the power of sin would be destroyed. We are no longer slaves to sin. Romans 6:6

I was thinking about my son this past week. He was born at Thanksgiving, and this time every year I am reminded of another thing to be thankful for. But not all the memories are good. His delivery was rough, and there were complications. He and his mom stayed in the hospital for several days, but I went home that night because family was coming over for Thanksgiving dinner. At the time I was a young retail manager, less than a year into the job, and terrified to ask for anything. The next morning was Black Friday, the busiest sales day of the year, and instead of being at the hospital with my newborn son, I went to work. Looking back, it breaks my heart that fear had that much power over me. I am embarrassed to admit that I left my wife and son alone after an emergency birth because I cared more about approval than presence. And the worst part? No one even noticed. No thank you, no good job, nothing. All that sacrifice, and it meant absolutely nothing. I carried that shame with me for years.

I have learned in recovery that I cannot rewrite that choice. I cannot go back and be the father or husband I should have been. I must stop wishing for a happier past. But what I can do is face the truth of who I was back then. I can admit that fear and people pleasing ran my life. I can admit that my thinking was so twisted that I believed showing up at work mattered more than showing up for my family. That kind of honesty hurts, but it is the only way I can grow. A living amends means I do not pretend it did not happen. It means I face the truth and ask God to change the patterns that drove me there in the first place. And then I allow Him to change me, by actually doing things differently.

So when my youngest daughter was born, I made a different choice. I asked for time off. Not just the day she was born, but the next few days too. I stayed with my wife. I held my daughter. I was present. And the feeling was completely different. There was no guilt, no shame, no heaviness following me around. Just gratitude, relief, and the sense that maybe I was finally becoming the man I always wanted to be.

That shift did not come from me trying harder. It came from working the steps with my sponsor and putting the principles of recovery into action in my life. This allowed God to untangle the fear that used to control me. That is what living amends is to me. It is making different choices in similar situations. This is an amends I make for myself, and because of it I am slowly becoming the version of me that God intended.

Prayer:God, thank You for showing me how to make living amends through the choices I make today. Help me stay honest, stay willing, and stay open to the changes You are forming in me. Amen.

Perfectly Human

Accepted without having to prove it

To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. Ephesians 1:6

Growing up in an alcoholic home, I learned that I had to be perfect or be punished. Love was conditional, and mistakes came with consequences. So when I began seeking God, I carried that same belief into my relationship with Him. I attended church every time the doors were open, read my Bible voraciously, and prayed continually. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was seeking God’s approval, trying to earn His love using the only skills I knew: by being good, trying to be perfect, and not making mistakes so I wouldn’t be punished by Him. I was trying to earn something that was impossible to attain, something God had already provided for me.

It was in recovery that I began to see what I was really doing. I was trying to control my relationship with God. If God was pleased with me, then I thought I would be safe with Him too. Deep down, I feared the ultimate punishment from Him, hell. It wasn’t easy for me to grasp any of this. My denial had many layers, and because of my extensive time spent studying the Bible, I had plenty of rationalization and justification for my beliefs, or so I thought. But God did for me what I couldn’t do for myself. He broke through the walls I had built to protect myself. By working the steps and finally being honest and vulnerable, I began to see that He accepted me, even with my faults and imperfections. Then came the aha moment: God made me perfectly human, not a perfect human. When I understood that, the walls I’d constructed to protect me and keep others out just seemed to crumble, and I felt the heavy weight of trying to be perfect, that I had carried for so long, finally fall away. For the first time, I could accept that God loved me without conditions.

Today I no longer try to be perfect. I understand now that perfection is only an illusion, just like control. My value isn’t based on how well I perform, but on accepting that I have value simply because I exist. I deserve to be loved for who I am, not for what I can do, but because He made me. And that, all by itself, is enough.

Prayer:
God, thank You for loving me just as I am. Thank You for making me perfectly human and for accepting me in Christ. Help me to rest in the truth that I don’t have to earn Your love or prove my worth. Teach me to live each day in Your grace, free from the illusion of perfection, and confident that I am already accepted in the Beloved. Amen.

Hearing With My Heart

Listening To Understand

People’s thoughts can be like a deep well, but someone with understanding can find the wisdom there. Proverbs 20:5

Last week at work, a colleague and I had different ideas about how to solve a situation. We both thought we were right, and we both dug in a little. A couple of days later, they hinted that they were open to trying something different. The part that got me was that their new idea sounded vaguely similar to what I had originally suggested. I thanked them and started to walk away, but they stopped me and asked, “Really? You’re going to let it go that easily?” That question hit me harder than I expected. Inside, I realized that I was waiting for something else. I wanted them to acknowledge it the way I wanted it said. I wanted the neat little package with a bow on top. I wanted them to acknowledge that they were acquiescing. It took me a minute, but I finally realized that I was letting my pride get in the way of working together.

Recovery is teaching me that my way is not the only way, and sometimes not even the best way. I am learning that expecting people who are not doing recovery work to act or communicate with the same tools I am learning is unrealistic. Not everyone speaks directly. Not everyone apologizes clearly. Not everyone labels their thoughts or feelings the way I am learning to. Some people hint, imply, or suggest things in their own way. When I expect them to say it the way I want it said, and they do not, I end up feeling hurt or frustrated. I start listening to my pride instead of staying open minded. Pride tells me that if the words do not match my preferred version, then I am being disrespected. I start thinking they are trying to manipulate me, and sometimes they might be. But most of the time, that is just my old way of thinking trying to sneak back in, not my recovering mind.

What I am discovering is that I need to listen beneath the surface. I need to hear what is being communicated, not just how it is phrased. My colleague was trying to apologize, even though they never came out and said that. They were agreeing with my idea. They were offering movement. They were offering collaboration. And I almost missed it. Pride has a way of narrowing my view and making me judge the package instead of recognizing the gift. God helps me apply the principles of recovery to slow down, breathe, and look again. When I do that, I can hear what is actually being communicated and not just what is spoken. In this way I am becoming open minded and learning to live at peace with others.

Prayer: God, help me hear people with humility and understanding. Teach me to listen beneath the surface, to recognize the heart behind the words, and to stay open to the wisdom You are showing me. Help me let go of my old thinking and walk in peace with those around me. Amen.

Temporary Sponsor

He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. 2 Corinthians 1:4

Like most of us, when I first came into recovery, I didn’t know what I was doing. I had spent years trying to manage life on my own, and it wasn’t working. I kept hearing in the meetings, “You need a sponsor.” I didn’t know what that really meant or entailed, but the pain was a great motivator and I was ready to stop hurting.

Back then I had met two men that I connected with. One from my traditional recovery group and one from a Christ-centered recovery group I recently started attending. I asked the man from my traditional group to sponsor me, but he said no. That rejection stung, but God was already working behind the scenes. The next week, I asked the other man. He said he’d be my temporary sponsor. At first that too hurt my feelings and felt like more rejection, but I was hurting, and at that point, I didn’t care. I just knew I needed help. What I didn’t realize was that “temporary” would turn into one of the most life-changing commitments I’d ever make.

We began meeting twice a week, once at night to do step work and another morning for coffee and conversation. I didn’t realize it then, but those moments were doing more than teaching me about recovery; they were teaching me how to be honest, accountable, and real. My sponsor didn’t preach at me. He didn’t try to fix me or tell me what to do. He just listened, guided, and modeled the kind of peace I had been missing. He shared pieces of his own story that made me realize I wasn’t alone. For the first time, I felt safe enough to be honest about my past and the pain I had carried for years. Through those early meetings, God began to show me that healing happens in relationship, not isolation. I started to see that He uses people to help people, and that letting someone in didn’t make me weak. It made me human.

Through that process, I began to trust. Not just my sponsor, but God working through him. Each time I opened up, something in me began to change. I started to realize that I didn’t have to have everything figured out. I just needed to be willing. I wasn’t used to that kind of safety or love. It wasn’t about control; it was about surrender. When he challenged me to face myself in the steps, I listened. And slowly, the walls I had built around my heart started to crumble. What began as a temporary arrangement became a lasting foundation. God used one man’s willingness to listen to bring about permanent change in me.

Now I understand that the commitments I make in faith, even small ones, give God room to work in big ways. When I said yes to a “temporary” sponsor, I was really saying yes to healing. God met me in that step of obedience and turned it into transformation.

Prayer

God, thank You for using people to help me when I couldn’t help myself. Thank You for those who guide me with wisdom, grace, and honesty. Help me stay willing to listen, to trust, and to take the next right step You put in front of me. Amen.