Earliest A.A. Leaders
Specifically Described Their Trust in God
Dick B.
Copyright 2013
Anonymous. All rights reserved
Making Up Some
“god of your own?”
Some today
have made up their own gods and not-gods. They’ve called them chairs,
somethings, somebodies, door knobs, light bulbs, the Great Pumpkin, the Big Dipper, and whatever they
are told they can do praying to a tree or a table. In later A.A., treatment
people, therapists, some AAs, and even clergy began thinking they were some new
self-made, extra-terrestrial “higher power.”
Not so with
four important Early AAs.
A.A. Pioneers
Heard: “God either is, or He isn’t;” and they chose God!
Bill Wilson
summarized the real God in whom they trusted. He did it in the First Edition of
the Big Book. And he clearly referred to the Creator! He referred to the Creator as such 12 times.
Called Him our Maker, our Heavenly Father, and the Father of Lights—all right
out of the Bible.
Here was
Bill’s statement of the real Solution for the alcoholic:
There
is a solution.
The great fact is just this, and nothing less: that we have
had deep and effective spiritual experiences, which have revolutionized our
whole attitude toward life, toward our fellows, and toward God’s universe. The
central fact of our lives today is the absolute certainty that our Creator has
entered into our hearts and lives in a way which is indeed miraculous.
Alcoholics Anonymous “The Big Book” The Original 1939
Edition: Bill W. With a New Introduction by Dick B. (Mineola, NY: Dover
Publications, Inc., 2011), 35-36.
The Pioneers
Made Up No God. They Specifically Used Bible Terms
The early
AAs were consistent in their references to trust in God, His Son, the Bible,
and the power of God that had made their cures possible and effective.
Bill W. said: “Henrietta, the Lord has been so
wonderful to me, curing me of this terrible disease, that I just want to keep
talking about it and telling people.” Alcoholics
Anonymous, 4th ed, 191.
DR. BOB said: “If you think you are an atheist, an
agnostic, a skeptic, or have any other form of intellectual pride which keeps
you from accepting what is in this book, I feel sorry for you . . . . Your
Heavenly Father will never let you down!” Alcoholics
Anonymous, 4th ed., 181.
A.A. Number Three (Bill
D.) said: “That
sentence, ‘The Lord has been so wonderful to me, curing me of this terrible
disease, that I just want to keep telling people about it,’ has been a sort of
a golden text for the A.A. program and for me.” Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed., 191.
Clarence S. (who got sober in February of 1938, was sponsored by Dr. Bob, and founded
A.A. in Cleveland in 1939) said--as he was about to be discharged from detox at
Akron City Hospital: “Then
he [Dr. Bob] asked, ‘Do you believe in God, young fella?’ . . . . ‘What does
that have to do with it?’ ‘Everything,’ he said. ‘I guess I do.’ ‘Guess,
nothing! Either you do or you don’t.’ ‘Yes I do.’ ‘That’s fine,’ Dr. Bob
replied, ‘Now we’re getting someplace. All right, get out of bed and on your
knees. We’re going to pray.’” DR. BOB and
the Good Oldtimers, 144.
When You Pray
for Help, Would You Ask a Light Bulb to Cure You!
Gloria Deo
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