Wednesday, February 29, 2012

A.A. History - The Four Absolutes - Again!






Alcoholics Anonymous History
A.A. – The Four Absolutes –The Facts Again!
Dick B.
© 2012 Anonymous. All rights reserved.
Summary

The “Four Absolutes” of A.A. were cherished “yardsticks” in earliest A.A.—standards for determining right behavior as measured through God’s eyes. And A.A.’s Co-founder Dr. Bob made that clear.[1] The Four Absolutes were Honesty, Purity, Unselfishness, and Love.

Robert E. Speer: The time-line for the recovery origins of these principles begins with Presbyterian missionary leader Robert E. Speer. In 1902, Speer published The Principles of Jesus.[2] Chapter 6 was titled “Jesus and Standards.”[3] And Speer there spelled out “some” moral principles that could be applied to determine and practice what was “right or wrong.” Speer said the teachings of Jesus set up absolute principles which didn’t allow men to measure their conduct by what they “thought” was right or wrong. Jesus, he said, enabled men to have absolute standards of conduct by which they were able to “know whether it is right or wrong, drag it into Jesus’ presence, and see how He looks at it, and how it looks to Him.”[4] Some have erroneously stated that Speer fashioned the four standards from the teachings in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5 to 7). But his citations were much more broad. Speer said that Jesus taught in a practical way in order to make people understand, and the illustrations Jesus used were themselves such as to make some principle perfectly clear. The teachings set up standards (Mark 9:33; Matt. 5:34, 37; 6:16; Mark 7:15; Luke 9:60). Perfection was his standard (Matt. 5:48). He had attained it (John 8:29). He demanded it. Right is to be right. Thinking it right or thinking it wrong does not make a thing right or wrong. Jesus, said Speer, set up an absolute standard of truth. He said, if God were your Father, you would love me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me. Why do ye not understand my speech? Even because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father, the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it (John 8:42-44). Jesus set up an absolute standard of unselfishness. Speer pointed to Mark 10:45: “For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but  to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. Jesus set up an absolute standard or purity. He tolerated no uncleanness whatsoever. . . . A hand or an eye, outer or inner sin, must be sacrificed to the claims of the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:29, 30). Jesus set up an absolute standard of love. Jesus said, “A new commandment I give unto you, That you love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another (John 13:34),

Henry B. Wright: Next in line comes Yale’s Professor Henry B. Wright. And in 1909, Wright published The Will of God and a Man’s Lifework.[5] Wright devoted this teaching to the relation of the act of surrender of self in doing God’s will. He contended that willingness to do God’s will is a necessary condition for knowledge of it. He pointed to the Bible and Nature as the parts of God’s will that every one may know.[6] Wright emphasized that God reveals His Universal Will for the world in Jesus, the Living Word, and in the Bible, the Written Word.[7] Then he asked if there were “absolute standards of right and wrong; how Jesus found out the particular will of God for himself, and said Jesus “always did the things which were pleasing to God.” Citing Scripture, Wright pointed to verses in the Bible dealing with purity (Matthew 5:29), unselfishness (Luke 14:33); honesty (Luke 16:11), and love (John 15:2). Wright explained that Jesus was sure of God’s presence and guidance; and Wright reconstructed the “absolute standards of right and wrong” from the teachings of Jesus and the Apostles. Wright quoted Robert E. Speer as follows:

Mr. Robert E. Speer has reconstructed from the teaching of Jesus the four standards in regard to which he never allowed himself an exception and with reference to which his teaching is absolute and unyielding. Jesus gives us no direct teaching in regard to such things as smoking, drinking, card playing, theatre, dancing, etc. He recognized that some men could decide one way and others just the opposite on like questions and yet both sides be true Christians. But in regard to four things there was no such option. A man must be pure, he must be honest, he must be unselfish, he must express himself in deeds of love or else he cannot see the kingdom of God. There is no exception to be made on these four counts.[8]

Having discussed many relevant verses applicable to the “Universal Will of God,” Wright then explained that God also has a Particular Will for each individual man, He suggested it rested on the “Fourfold Touchstone of Jesus and the Apostles.” He suggested, as to the four touchstones, that there be a test of Purity, Honesty, Unselfishness, and Love. He said that obedience provided the assurance as to one’s duty and power to achieve results. Wright illustrated:

To every problem, great or small, which presents itself in a small matter like one’s bearing in a game of sport, in a large matter like the choice of a life career, the Christian who is absolutely surrendered to God asks himself this question: “Is the step which I had planned to take an absolutely pure one? Is it an absolutely honest one? Is it the most unselfish one? Is it the fullest possible expression of my love? If it fails to measure up to any one of these four standards it cannot be God’s will and I must not take it, no matter what the refusal may cost me in suffering, mental or physical. As he holds his instrument of apprehension, the human will, resolutely to this standard, the Christian is conscious of its becoming strong both to know and to do God’s will and there comes the undoubted, the compelling conviction which guides and impels him forward. . . . The mysterious meeting place in the prepared and willing heart between the human and divine where precisely the will is finally moved into line with God’s of these things knoweth no man, save only the spirit of God.[9]

Discussing each of the four “absolutes” in turn, and using purity as the first, he proposed the following: “Is the step which I had planned to take an absolutely pure one? If it is not, it cannot be God’s will for that life.” And as to each of the four absolute standards, Wright would thus look at the question in terms of purity versus impurity, and then cite applicable Bible verses that provided definitions of God’s will, for example, as to fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, adultery. Furthermore, each absolute—purity, unselfishness, honesty, and love—was to be related to the other three so that if something were deemed pure, it must also be absolutely unselfish, absolutely honest, and absolutely an act of love.

Frank N. D. Buchman and the Oxford Group:
The Oxford Group’s Four Absolutes can be found in the speeches of its founder Frank Buchman.[10] They can also be found in books about Buchman, descriptions of Oxford Group principles, in Rev. Sam Shoemaker’s writings, in A.A. General Services Conference-approved books discussing the Oxford Group, in Anne Smith’s writings, and in some Oxford Groups today.[11] As stated, the historical chain begins with Robert E. Speer. Speer’s discussion and cited verses were expanded by Henry B. Wright. And, according to Oxford Group activist and long-time employee T. Willard Hunter, Henry B. Wright was the most influential force in Frank Buchman’s life, other than Buchman’s mother. Buchman’s biographer Garth Lean explained:

The moral standards which he [Buchman] used as a test of directing thoughts also became central to Buchman’s life and teaching: he took them as measuring rods for daily living. Here again he was indebted to Henry Wright. “The absolutes” had originally been set out, as a summary of Christ’s moral teaching, by Robert E. Speer in his book, The Principles of Jesus. Buchman had several times heard Speer preach at Mount Airy, but it was in Wright’s book that he first found the summarized standards “in regards of which,” Wright maintained, “Christ’s teaching is absolute and unyielding.” Wright defined them as “the four-fold touchstone of Jesus and the apostles” and maintained that an individual could apply them “to every problem, great or small which presents itself . . . if (anything) fails to measure up to any one of these four it cannot be God’s will.”[12]

Reverend Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr. became a colleague of Frank Buchman’s in the earliest 1920’s. He was called in 1925 to be rector of Calvary Episcopal Church in New York. He shortly became the Oxford Group’s most prolific author, Frank Buchman’s chief lieutenant in the United States, and actually provided space in Calvary House (adjacent to the church) for the Oxford Group’s American headquarters where Buchman himself lived when he was in the United States. Shoemaker also became a close friend of Bill Wilson, taught Wilson most of the spiritual principles that were embodied in the Twelve Steps, and was dubbed a “cofounder of A.A.” by Wilson himself.[13] Wilson actually asked Shoemaker to write the 12 Steps, but Sam declined, saying they should be   written by an alcoholic, namely Bill.

But Shoemaker did write extensively on the importance of the Four Absolutes.[14] And the following is indicative of his view:

We must get to the point of whether the man is “willing to do his will” in all areas. Take the four standards of Christ: absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness, and absolute love. When people’s lives are wrong, they are usually wrong on one or more of these standards. . . . By our own frank honesty about ourselves and our willingness, under God as He guides, to share anything in our own experience that will help the other person, and by the willingness to ask God-inspired questions of them that carry the matter right down to the roots, we shall get deep enough to know the real problems . . . . If the person is honest with himself and with God, he will be honest with us and be ready to take the next step, which is a decision to surrender these sins, with himself, wholly to God.[15]

Early A.A.: In a few words, we can summarize how the Four Absolutes were handled in early Alcoholics Anonymous.

Bill Wilson: Wilson was actively involved in Oxford Group activities from late 1934 through August, 1937. He and his wife attended many meetings, attended Oxford Group house parties, and met Frank Buchman and Rev. Shoemaker and other leaders such as Rev. W. Irving Harris and his wife Julia. Bill himself was much involved in an Oxford Group team in late 1935 and early 1936. Bill said he had heard plenty about the Four Absolutes. However, his wife Lois claimed, the “Oxford Group kind of kicked us out [because] she and Bill were not considered ‘maximum’ by the groupers.”[16] By October 30, 1940, Bill said: “I am always glad to say privately that some of the Oxford Group presentation and emphasis upon the Christian message saved my life. Yet it is equally true that other attitudes of the O.G. nearly got me drunk again, and we long since discovered that if we were to approach alcoholics successfully, these [attitudes] would have to be abandoned.” [17] He wrote a laundry list of 8 criticisms of the Oxford Group, including a condemnation of the four absolutes, saying “when the word ‘absolute’ was put in front of these attributes, they either turned people away by the hundreds or gave a temporary spiritual inflation resulting in collapse.”[18] Despite these remarks, Wilson did another turnabout. According to one historian, Wilson wrote in 1960:

In the old days of the Oxford Groups, they were forever talking about the Four Absolutes—Honesty, Purity, Unselfishness, and Love—trying to get too good by Thursday. . . . Absolutes in themselves are not necessarily destructive. Every sound theological system contains them. When we say that our destiny is to grow in the likeness and image of God, we are stating a healthy relation between a relative and an absolute state of affairs. Therefore when writing the Twelve Steps, it was necessary to include some sort of absolute value or else they wouldn’t have been theologically sound. . . . That could have been unfortunate and as misleading as we found them in the Oxford Group emphasis. So in Steps Six and Seven, and in the use of the word God, we did include them.[19]

Dr. Bob Smith: His position was and remained the opposite of Bill’s. In his last major address to AAs, Dr. Bob said:

The four absolutes, as we called them, were the only yardsticks we had in the early days, before the Steps. I think the absolutes still hold good and can be extremely helpful. I have found at times that a question arises, and I want to do the right thing, but the answer is not obvious. Almost always, if I measure my decision carefully by the yardsticks of absolute honesty, absolute unselfishness, absolute purity, and absolute love, and it checks up pretty well with those four, then my answer can’t be very far out of the way.[20]

Dr. Bob’s wife Anne Ripley Smith: In her journal from which she shared with early AAs and their families, Anne spoke repeatedly about how to apply the four standards. She said:

Test your thoughts. It is possible to receive suggestions from your subconscious mind. Check your thoughts by the four standards. . . . Make the moral test. 4 standards. . . . Basis of an interview. Is a challenge on the four standards. . . .  Why I had been absolutely honest but not living. . . . Follow Christ’s absolute commandment. . . .  Absolute honesty demands that we no longer wear a mask. . . . Sharing. . . It is being honest even after it hurts. . . . Every time we register aloud the new attitude and change of heart with absolute honesty, another bridge is burned behind us and another stake is driven in to mark our progress. . . . Check your life constantly by the four absolutes.[21]

Clarence H. Snyder who founded Cleveland A.A.: Many might conclude that when Clarence Snyder (who got sober in February, 1938, and remained sober until his death years later) founded Alcoholics Anonymous in Cleveland, Ohio, he took the best of A.A. there. The best at that time! He embraced the Bible, the Four Absolutes, the Big Book, and the Twelve Steps. AAs achieved a 93% success rate.[22] Clarence said:

New people were told they had to read the Bible—The King James Version of the Bible. They were instructed to do this on a daily basis. Clarence said that newcomers were also told to read The Upper Room and to read the Sermon on the Mount by Emmet Fox. Clarence said the new people were then instructed on the Four Standards. These were the Biblical principles the Oxford Group people had taken from the teachings of Jesus Christ found in the Bible. These “Four Standards” were also called the “Four Absolutes”—Absolute Honesty, Unselfishness, Love and Purity.[23]

Clarence frequently took newcomers through the newly written Twelve Steps in two days time. He wrote a pamphlet on going through the Steps to guide them.[24]

What Happened to the Four Absolutes?

Bill Wilson framed the “moral inventory” items in Step Four. In that Step and in Steps Ten and Eleven, he proposed testing conduct for resentment, fears, selfishness, and harms done to others. He also claimed that the A.A. program called for grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty.[25] The Absolutes, as such, simply vanished from the Big Book program of recovery. What can be said is that those, like myself, who have visited A.A. meetings and members all over the United States and reviewed thousands of pieces of A.A. literature, frequently encounter mention of the Four Absolutes, especially among those who have great respect and affection for Dr. Bob or Clarence Snyder. However, the idea of relating each of the standards to a teaching of Jesus has usually been replaced by pamphlets or discussions of what, in the opinion of the particular writer, constitutes conduct consistent with this or that absolute. Also, the writers and speakers often omit the critical part of the Four Absolute tests. Those applying them were also to look to God and His Word for illustration and understanding and also to ask God for the wisdom in applying them to proposed action (James 1:5-8).

Gloria Deo

[1] The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous: Biographical Sketches Their Last Major Talks (New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1972, 1975), 17.
[2] Robert E. Speer, The Principals of Jesus: Applied to Some Questions of To-Day (New York: Association Press, 1902).
[3] Speer, The Principles of Jesus, 33-36.
[4] Speer, The Principles of Jesus, 33.
[5] Henry B. Wright, The Will of God and a Man’s Lifework (NY:  Association Press, 1924). Copyrighted in 1909 by The International Committee of Young Men’s Christian Associations.
[6] Wright, The Will of God, 135.
[7] Wright, The Will of God, 138.
[8] Wright, The Will of God, 169.
[9] Wright, The Will of God, 173-74.
[10] Frank N. D. Buchman, Remaking the World (London: Blandford Press, 1961), 36, 40, 96, 131.
[11] For a thorough review of these statements, the supporting bibliography, and a discussion of the Oxford Group and the Four Absolutes, see Dick B., The Oxford Group and Alcoholics Anonymous: A Design for Living That Works New Rev. ed. (Kihei, HI: Paradise Research Publications, Inc., 1998), 237-46.
[12] Garth Lean, Frank Buchman: A Life (London: Constable, 1985), 76
[13] These statements are documented and thoroughly discussed in Dick B., New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A. Pittsburgh ed. (Kihei, HI: Paradise Research Publications, Inc., 1999).
[14] Dick B., New Light on Alcoholism, 55, 56, 97, 98, 101, 107-09, 117, 142-43, 159, 167, 234-35, 239, 241-42, 312, 314, 393, 414, 419-20, 432-33, 455, 462, 523,
[15] Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr., The Church Can Save The World (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1938), 110-14; Dick B., New Light on Alcoholism, 56-57.
[16] Pass It On, 174.
[17] Pass It On, 171.
[18] Pass It On, 172-73.
[19] Ernest Kurtz, Not-God: A History of Alcoholics Anonymous.(Center City, MN: Hazelden, 1979), 242-43.
[20] The Co-Founders of Alcoholics Anonymous: Biographical Sketches: Their Last Major Talks (New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1972, 1975), 17.
[21] Dick B., Anne Smith’s Journal 1933-1939:A.A.’s Principles of Success.3rd ed, (Kihei, HI: Paradise Research Publications, Inc., 1998), 32-33.
[22] Mitchell K., How It Worked: The Story of Clarence H. Snyder and The Early Days of Alcoholics Anonymous in Cleveland, Ohio (Washingtonville, NY: AA Big Book Study Group, 1997), 108.
[23] Mitchell K., How It Worked,, 69.
[24] Mitchell K., How It Worked, 240-44.
[25] Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th ed. (NY: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 2001), 28.


Contact:
Dick B.
P.O. Box 837
Kihei, Hawaii
96753-0837
Ph/fax: (808)874-4876
dickb@dickb.com

© 1999-2012
Paradise Research
Publications, Inc.
All rights reserved.

Trademarks and Disclaimer: ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS®, A.A.®, and Big Book® are registered trademarks of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. Dick B.'s web site, Paradise Research Publications, Inc., and Good Book Publishing Company are neither endorsed nor approved by nor associated or affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc.


Monday, February 27, 2012

A Big Book Seminar


A Big Book Seminar

What It Did and What It Still Can Do



Dick B.

Copyright 2012 Anonymous. All rights reserved



My Joe and Charlie Sacramento Beginning



There was a guy named Tony who showed  up at all the Beginner’s Meetings on Friday in Larkspur. He was one of the first to hand me his card and phone number when I came in. He sponsored a number of my newcomer friends, and he always had them sitting in the front row with Big Books open throughout the meeting. They were serious. They were sober. And they stayed sober and began sponsoring others. One of those great examples I had at the beginning.



But then there was the matter of the Big Book:



Tony always had his sponsees come to his home on Sunday and read the Big Book with him. Neither my sponsor nor his sponsor ever even offered to do that. Tony knew how to take people through the Twelve Steps, and you could tell it from the relevant points they shared. My sponsor and his sponsor never explained to me once how to take the Steps. And I went to Big Book study after Big Book study meeting, and Step meeting after Step meeting, and—with my fuzzy brain and confused thinking, I was a poor example of how the learn and apply the solution of A.A.



One evening, Tony came to the Beginner’s Meeting. He announced that there was a Big Book Seminar in Sacramento; and he said this seminar was a “must” for those who wanted to learn the program of recovery. I went. I sat in front. My book was open. I heard Frank Mauser, archivist from General Services in New York give an hour talk on A.A. history. And then I followed Joe McQuany and Charlie Parmley line by line through the Big Book. And the light went on.



In fact, as the years rolled on, I insisted that each of my sponsees go to Sacramento in September and attend the Big Book Seminar. Usually there were about 800 in attendance. As I did with every function involving my sponsees and meetings, I was always there, and they were staying in a motel with me throughout the sessions. The same was true for Tony and his ever-flowing tide of eager newcomers.



What Came of It?



I learned what to look for in the “problem,” in the “solution,” and in the “practical program of action” that in all made up the program of recovery through the Steps. So did the men I sponsored. And they passed on to their newcomers the same information. I might add that neither my own sponsor nor his sponsor ever attended these events.



I became a good friend of the GSO archivist Frank Mauser. He introduced me to Joe and Charlie. I became good friends with all three and actually met with Joe in Little Rock twice and at Founders Day once where we discussed the history, the Big Book, the Steps, God, the Bible, prayer, and recovery. Later, Frank said he could no longer do the history segment and suggested that I take over his slot at the seminars—something that never happened because the “voice” of the Seminar” decided he wanted the task. However, I was hot on the history trail by then. Frank invited me to stay in his apartment while I was meeting Nell Wing, researching at World Services headquarters, and going up to Bedford Hills to research at Stepping Stones. Frank facilitated it all. Nell Wing was very helpful. And Frank even put me in touch with Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, with whom I met. And he suggested T. Willard Hunter as a speaker and as a friend of A.A. thoroughly knowledgeable of A.A.’s Oxford Group roots.



What’s The Important Lesson?



At this point, my four friends are dead. I believe Frank died first. Then Nell. Then Joe. And finally Charlie. But in my own life, all four had sown the seeds that produced a deep conviction that there were at least three deep holes in A.A. as I inherited its benefactions on April 23, 1986.



The first hole was the need for those who were not merely serious about permanent sobriety, but also realized that the Big Book suggested much more: (a) The need to “find” God. (b) The need to establish a relationship with God. (c) The need to see what Bill and Bob saw in the book they authorized in 1939—the need for a “spiritual experience” that would enable permanent cure and a live of service to God and those about us. This could not be done without a good teacher or teachers with clear minds who—like Joe and Charlie—had thoroughly studied the Big Book, achieved long term sobriety, and had the clarity of mind to teach others with laughter, sincerity, and effectiveness.



The second hole was one that both Joe and Charlie—as well as Frank Mauser and Nell Wing—urged me to pursue and encouraged me by their help and suggestions. That hole was the huge gap in the history of A.A. and the sources and application of its biblical roots.



The third hole was the greatest and most overlooked. Nobody seemed to have spent any significant time finding out where the biblical and other Christian ideas so prominent in early A.A. had come from. They never talked about: (1) The great Christian evangelists like Moody, Meyer, Sankey, and Billy Sunday. (2) The important conversions and revivals conducted by lay brethren of the Young Men’s Christian Association. (3) The key elements of the acceptance of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior by those derelicts and drunks – like Ebby Thacher and Bill Wilson—who had gone to the altar and been born again. (4) The unique exemplary techniques of the early Salvation Army workers in the slums of London and then America. (5) The program of the Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor—whose principles and practices became those of the early Akron A.A. program. Nor had anyone devoted time to seeing how the foregoing Christian organizations and people—plus the Christian churches, Sunday schools, parental influences, prayer meetings, Bible studies, daily chapel, and the  Young Men’s Christian Association as well as the revivals had impacted on the Christian upbringing of Dr. Bob. Finally nobody seemed to pick up on the fact that the first three AAs—Wilson, Smith, and Bill Dotson—all believed in God, had accepted Christ, had studied the Bible, had turned to God for help, had immediately learned to get busy helping others, and who never, ever drank again. All this before there was a Big Book. Before there were Twelve Steps or Twelve Traditions, Before there were drunkalogs. And before there were meetings of the kind that exist today.



What’s the Future for the Big Book, the History, and the Bible in Recovery?



It is fair to say that every alcoholic or addict (and Bill W. and Dr. Bob were both alcoholics and addicts) needs permanently to quit pursuing and trying to control alcohol and drug use. Forever! With a sane mind restored, why would they want them or the disasters they bring. They don’t need them. They don’t need the misery created for themselves and others through the excessive use of them. And their lives, entrusted to and guided by the power, love, forgiveness and deliverance of God and His Son Jesus Christ, hold promise of an abundant life and an everlasting life. That’s the starting point – going to any lengths to overcome the alcoholism and addiction.



The Big Book is filled with biblical references that most AAs would never recognize. It is filled with language that encourages reliance on God, prayer, study, and helping others. To stand on sound ground, the oldtimers need to learn and teach that language. And the newcomers need to hear it repeated, learn it, and act on it. Without that foundation, the retreat to “acceptance,” “spirituality,” nonsense gods, and even not-god-ness. They just don’t know their own Big Book.



The history? Few realize what a devilish battering ram has been propelled at alcoholics. It is pushed by a wide and diverse group of enemies. Christians who think that A.A. is not of the Lord. Who think you will go to hell if you enter an A.A. meeting. And who condemn any Christian who dares set foot in a room peopled with atheists, unbelievers, those with other religious or no religious beliefs. No matter that this diverse group of suffering people need help and, at the beginning, gladly receive it whether tendered by Christians or former derelicts.

The anti-AA hostility is pushed by those who try to paint the fellowship as ungodly, unchristian, and unworthy because of the sins of its cofounders and others. The anti—AA hostility today is motivated by men and women of science, of proponents of First Amendment prohibitions, of psychiatric and pharmaceutical approaches, and by “rational” recovery—recovery without God.

Then there are the AAs themselves who cry out against the mention of God, Jesus Christ, the Bible, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and of some denominational belief.


The Bible? People just don’t know the biblical practices that have helped suffering people for centuries, that were employed by Christians in the 1800’s, and that were commonplace in the early A.A. fellowship



The Future and The Hope Can Be Embellished by Big Book Seminars



As stated, Joe and Charlie were teachers. Frank Mauser, the archivist, was both historian and teacher. Joe and Charlie insisted on line by line study. They salted it with humor and sagacity.

They had done their homework and preparation. They had long-term sobriety. And they loved A.A. and its program of recovery. Their talk exuded confidence in the subject matter.



Today, there are a host of Big Book studies, groups, and seminars. I receive their literature, their email notices, and their website materials with great frequency.



Are they valuable?



They, of course, are no better than the wisdom, teaching ability, experience, and attention to detail of those who conduct them. Like A.A. itself, they are becoming more and more available.

And, even if badly organized, presented, or taught, they at least get newcomer and oldtimer alike to put his eyes on the Big Book, use his growing return of mental capacity, and distinguish between the sluggard and the grey beard. If it’s bad, he can vote with his feet. If it’s fair, he can improve it. If it’s good, he can foster attendance at it.



Is there a future? Yes. I needed help in the 1980’s, and I sure got it at the Big Book Seminars conducted by the two drunks from the State of Arkansas. God Bless them. And God bless those who try to emulate their achievements, perhaps even improve on them, today.






Gloria Deo

Sunday, February 26, 2012

"A First Century Christian Fellowship" - Model for Recovery Today


A First Century Christian Fellowship



Major Sources for Observing Early A.A.’s Apostolic Principles, Practices, and Resemblance to First Century Christianity at Work



By Dick B.

© 2012 Anonymous. All rights reserved



A Common Observation about “Old-School” Alcoholics Anonymous



Alcoholics Anonymous History: A.A. cofounder Dr. Bob called the first A.A. group (known as “Akron Number One”)—founded on July 4, 1935—“a Christian fellowship.” [DR. BOB and the Good Oldtimers (New York, NY: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1980), 118]



Of the five Rockefeller people—including John D. Rockefeller, Jr—who met the early AAs, listened to Dr. William Silkworth, and read the report that Frank Amos had given to them in February 1938, all said something to the effect, “Why this is First Century Christianity at work. What can we do to help?” And they did help.



But long before that, Christian evangelists were telling New Englanders and many in other parts of the world how the Apostles not only found salvation, but taught and lived Christianity—healing drunks, addicts, and derelicts along the way.



And then there was the Oxford Group and that American sparkplug of its early period, Rev. Samuel M. Shoemaker, Jr. Bill Wilson called Shoemaker a “cofounder” of A.A. Bill discussed the proposed Big Book and Step contents with Shoemaker. He even asked Sam to write the 12 Steps, but Sam humbly declined. Yet the very language of the 12 Steps paralleled Sam’s teachings—teaching founded on basic ideas in the Bible that Dr. Bob said were the foundations for the Steps.



Shoemaker and many other early Oxford Group people called their life-changing group and groups “A First Century Christian Fellowship” and defined what that phrase meant to them and their groups.



“A First Century Christian Fellowship”



At the times Bill W. (1934-1937) and Dr. Bob (1933 until at least 1939) were involved with the Oxford Group, it was actively using the name “A First Century Christian Fellowship.” And here are some of the ways people described the personal work with others of members of that important A.A. predecessor, the Oxford Group.



In his popular book, Life Changers, Harold Begbie (who had written Twice Born Men and much more about General William Booth and the Salvation Army) described the Group this way:



Above all, the Group was a Fellowship—a first-Century Christian Fellowship controlled by the Holy Spirit. [Dick B., The Oxford Group & Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 31]



We discuss and cite precise sources for the following statements:



. . . Frank Buchman’s formation of what he and his friends called “A First Century Christian Fellowship.” Buchman had said, “It is an attempt to get back to the beliefs and methods of the Apostles.” He said, “We not only accept their beliefs, but also decided to practice their methods” [Dick B., The Oxford Group & Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 286]



In Life Changers, author Begbie also wrote:



Since those words were written he has paid a visit to the United States in company with F. B, . . .



----



In his last letter written from America he tells me that he is entering with others into “A First Century Christian Fellowship,” explaining that they wish to get back to the type of Christianity which was maintained by the apostles—“We not only accept their beliefs, but are also decided to practice their methods.”

           

He announces in detail the elemental beliefs of a First Century Christianity. He believes in:



The possibility of immediate and continued fellowship with the Holy Spirit—guidance.

The proclamation of a redemptive gospel—personal, social, and national salvation.

The possession of fullness of life—rebirth, and an ever-increasing power and wisdom.

The propagation of their life by individuals to individuals—personal religion.



            Out of these beliefs proceeds the method of propagation:



Love for the sinner.

Hatred of the sin.

Fearless dealing with sin.

The presentation of Christ as the cure for sin.

The sharing and giving of self, with and for others.



“We are more concerned,” he writes, “with testifying to real experiences, explicable only on the hypothesis that God’s power has brought them to pass, through Christ, than with teaching an abstract ethical doctrine.”



Rev. Samuel Shoemaker spoke of the Group as “A First Century Christian Fellowship” as follows:



The Spirit can communicate His truth to a spiritual fellowship of believers in ways He cannot communicate to individuals: it is another phase of Christ’s meaning when He said that “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. He is wherever a believer is; but He is present in heightened reality in the fellowship. [Dick B., The Oxford Group & Alcoholics Anonymous, 293]



In his first significant book, Realizing Religion, Shoemaker had the following to say about the days “when the Church had martyrs in it.” Shoemaker wrote at page 67:



I believe that originally this was the spiritual impulse, entirely apart from considerations of ecclesiastical order or the founding of a brotherhood by Jesus, which welded Christians together in the days when the Church had martyrs in it. The value of united prayer and worship, of inspiring and instructing a group bent on one object, the constant impact of the words and the interpretation of Jesus, has often been dwelt upon. . .



The Acts of the Apostles



In Acts chapters 1 to 6, there are a number of descriptions of what the First Century Christians did, what they had received, and how they fellowshipped together. Here we will just quote two segments.



The first from Acts 2:38-43, 46-47:



Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.

And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation.

Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.

And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers.

And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. . . .



And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart.

Praising God, and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.



 The second segment from Acts 4:29-32:



And now, Lord, behold their threatenings: and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak thy word.

By stretching forth thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus.

And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with boldness. And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul. . . . And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all.



The Keys to Applying First Century Christianity in Recovery Programs Today



Our latest title is:



How to Conduct “Old School” 12-Step Recovery Meetings Using Conference-Approved Literature: A Dick B. Guide for Christian Leaders and Workers in the Recovery Arena.



In a small number of pages, this new book—very succinctly and very specifically—covers the ground above and then shows how the successful “Christian fellowship” practices of the First Century and of the early A.A. group in Akron can be applied today and fully supported by Conference-approved literature published by Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. And how those who join together in Christian fellowship can attain healing and a whole life in the same way the Apostles did and that the old school AAs did.



Gloria Deo


Saturday, February 25, 2012

Shoemaker's Contributions to the 12 Steps


Dick B.

© 2005. All rights reserved



Studying the Steps and

Looking at Sam Shoemaker’s Language



The Teachings of Rev. Sam Shoemaker That Inspired Each Step



[For more specifics, see my latest title, Twelve Steps for You; http://www.dickb.com/titles.shtm]



Specific Shoemaker Ideas in A.A.



Every AA who stays in our fellowship long enough to be exposed to its Big Book, its Twelve Steps, and its meeting buzzwords will readily recognize thoughts that seem to have come directly from the books and other writings of Sam Shoemaker.



These include: (1) Self-surrender. (2) Self is not God. (3) God either is, or He isn’t. (4)  “Turning point.” (5) Conversion. (6) Prayer. (7) Fellowship. (8) Willingness. (9) Self-examination. (10) Confession of faults to God, self, and another. (11) Amends. (12) “Thy will be done.” (13) Spiritual Experience. (14) Spiritual Awakening. (15) The unmanageable life. (16) Power greater than ourselves. (17) God as you understand Him. (18) The “Four Absolutes”-- honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love. (19) Guidance of God. (20) “Faith without works is dead.” (21) “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” (22) Clear references to Almighty God (using Bible terms) as our “Creator,” “Maker,” “Father,” “Spirit,” “God of our fathers,” and “Father of Lights.” (23) The Lord’s Prayer. (24) Jesus’s “sermon on the mount.” (25) Self-centeredness. (26) Fear. (27) Grudges. (28) Quiet Time. (29) Reliance on God. (30) Relationship with God. (31) “Giving it away to keep it.” (32) “News, not views.” (33) God has a plan. (34) Seeking God first. (35) Belief in God. (36) Born again. (37) Marvel at what God has done for you. (38) Let go! (39) Abandon yourself to Him [God]. (40) “Not my will but Thine be done.” And many others.



You can find, in my title “New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A.,” a list of 149 Shoemaker expressions that very closely parallel A.A. language. Many more can be found in specific quotations from Shoemaker’s books—books which have been fully reviewed in my New Light on Alcoholism title on Shoemaker.



Shoemaker and our Twelve Steps



Make no mistake. Whatever Bill Wilson may have said or implied from time to time, Sam Shoemaker was not the only source of A.A.’s spiritual ideas. Wilson often steered his applause in Sam’s direction in an effort to avoid Roman Catholic and other objections to the Oxford Group from which A.A.’s ideas also came and of which early A.A. was a part. Moreover, Bill never mentioned A.A. specifics from Dr. Bob, Anne Smith, the Bible, Quiet Time, God’s direct guidance or Christian literature that was daily fare in early A.A.



Remember also! Dr. Bob said he did not write the Twelve Steps and had nothing to do with writing them. Those Steps represented Bill’s personal interpretation of the spiritual program that had been in progress since 1935. Dr. Bob emphasized, on more than one occasion, that A.A.’s basic ideas had come from study of the Bible. Dr. Bob studied the Bible. Daily, for three months, Anne Smith read the Bible to Bill and Bob. Bob read the Bible to AAs. He quoted the Bible to AAs. He gave them Bible literature. And he frequently stressed Bible study, stating that the Book of James, 1 Corinthians 13, and Jesus’s sermon on the mount (Matthew 5 to 7) were considered absolutely essential in the early spiritual recovery program. Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob both said that the sermon on the mount contained the underlying philosophy of A.A.



Nonetheless, Sam’s own imprint is on the Steps. Every one of them. His imprint was on the presentation of Oxford Group ideas that Ebby Thacher made to Bill Wilson in Towns Hospital. And we will briefly take a look at just where Shoemaker’s language parallels the language of the Twelve Steps. In fact, our third chapter in New Light on Alcoholism provides further details and complete documentation.



            Step One: Shoemaker spoke of the gap between man and God which man is powerless to bridge, man having lost the power to deal with sin for himself. As to the unmanageable life, Sam referred to the prayer in the Oxford Group so often described in “Victor’s Story” and quoted by Anne Smith in her journal: “God manage me, because I can’t manage myself.”



            Step Two: Sam spelled out the need for a “Power greater than ourselves.” He quoted Hebrews 11:6 for the proposition that God is. He declared: God is God, and self is not God; and that man must so believe. Sam urged seeking God first, from Matthew 6:33. He espoused the “experiment of faith” by which man believes that God is; seeks God first in his actions, and then knows God by doing God’s will, and seeing that God provides the needed power. For this idea, Sam frequently cited John 7:17.



            Step Three: Sam taught about the crisis of self-surrender as the turning point for a religious life, quoting William James’s Varieties of Religious Experience. Sam said it involved being born again; and declared that man must make a decision to renounce sins, accept Jesus Christ as Saviour; and begin Christian life in earnest. Sam illustrated the surrender using language similar to that in A.A.: namely, a “decision to cast my will and my life on God.” Many times, Sam said one need only surrender as much of himself as he understands to as much of God as he understands. A clear precursor of A.A.’s “God as we understood Him”–which has unfortunately been misunderstood and has been attributed to other sources.



            Step Four: Sam wrote of a self-examination to find where one’s life fell short of the Four Absolute Standards of Jesus: honesty, purity, unselfishness, and love. One was to write down exactly where he had “fallen short.” There was a “moral obligation” to face these facts, recognize these as blocks to God, and be “ruthlessly, realistically honest.”



            Step Five: Shoemaker taught of honesty with self and honesty with God, quoted James 5:16 for the importance of confession to others, and stressed the need for detailed sharing of secrets.



            Step Six: Though the fact of Bill’s borrowing of this “conviction” step from the Oxford Group 5 C’s seems to have been overlooked, Shoemaker taught often about the need for man’s conviction that he is suffering from spiritual misery, has (by his sins) become estranged from God, and needs to come back to God in honest penitence. Sam urged willingness to ask God exactly where one is failing and then to admit that sin.



            Step Seven: Sam clarified this as the “conversion” step of the 5 C’s. It meant a new birth, he said. It meant humility. It meant, for Shoemaker, the assumption upon ourselves of God’s will for us and the opening of ourselves to receiving the “grace of God which alone converts.” It meant “drawing near and putting ourselves in position to be converted. . . utter dedication to the will of God.” Shoemaker often defined “sin” as that which blocks us from God and from others.” So, originally, did Big Book language. And each of the foregoing life-changing steps hangs on early A.A.’s definition of sin and the “removal” process of examining for sin, confessing sin, becoming convicted of sin, and becoming converted through surrendering it. The conversion experience, according to Shoemaker and early A.A., established or enabled rediscovery of a “relationship with God” and initiated the new life that developed from the relationship with God which conversion opened. Since both the Sixth and Seventh Steps were new to A.A. thinking and added something to the original “surrenders” to Jesus Christ, these Steps cannot easily be understood at all without seeing them in terms of the complete surrender, the new relationship, the new birth, and giving the sins to God, as Shoemaker saw the process and as Bill attempted to write it into the recovery path.



            Step Eight: Wilson added this step to the Oxford Group’s “restitution” idea. Bill also incorporated the Shoemaker talk of “willingness” to ask God’s help in removing the blocks, being convicted of the need for restitution, and then being sent “to someone with restoration and apology.”



            Step Nine: Sam said the last stand of self is pride. There can be no talk of humility, he said, until pride licks the dust, and one then acts to make full restoration and restitution for wrongs done. As AAs in Akron did, Sam also quoted from the sermon on the mount those verses enjoining the bringing of a gift to the altar without first being reconciled to one’s brother (Matthew 5:22-24). Restitution was not merely a good deed to be done. It was a command of God from the Bible that wrongs be righted as part of the practicing the principle of love. If one understands Shoemaker, one can understand the absurdity of some present-day AAs’ guilt-ridden suggestions about writing a letter to a dead person or volunteering help for the down-trodden or making a substitutionary gift to some worthy cause. Sam taught that the required amends were not about works. They were not about guilt. They were about love!



            Step Ten: This step concerned daily surrender and the Oxford Group idea of “continuance.” Sam taught it was necessary to continue self-examination, confession, conviction, the seeking of God’s help, and the prompt making of amends. This continued action was to follow the new relationship with God and others that resulted from removal of the sin problem in the earlier steps.



            Step Eleven: Sam wrote eloquently about Quiet Time, Bible study, prayer, and “meditation” (listening for God’s guidance). Sam urged daily contact with God for guidance, forgiveness, strength, and spiritual growth. So does A.A.’s Big Book. Quiet Time was a “must” in early A.A. And Shoemaker defined every aspect of Quiet Time from the necessity for a new birth to a new willingness to study, pray, listen, and read rather than to speak first and lead with the chin.



            Step Twelve: This step comprehends: (1) A spiritual awakening, the exact meaning of which Shoemaker spelled out in his books and in his talks to AAs. He said it required conversion, prayer, fellowship, and witness. (2) A message about what God has accomplished for us, a phrase which Shoemaker himself used, saying, in several ways: “You have to give Christianity away to keep it.”(3) Practicing the new way of living in harmony with God’s will and in love toward others, an idea easily recognized from Sam’s teachings that a spiritual awakening comes from conversion. And that the gospel message concerns God’s grace and power. And that the principles to be practiced are defined in the Bible. Accordingly, our Twelfth Step language, without input from Sam’s own writings, has become ill-defined and illusory. For A.A. Big Book students know that none of the three 12 Step ideas is set forth or explained in the chapter of the Big Book dealing with the Twelfth Step. To be frank, A.A. left Christianity in the dust. In so doing, AAs lost an understanding of what Sam Shoemaker taught and Dr. Bob emphasized: That conversion, the gospel message, and love and service were defined in the Book of Acts, the Four Absolutes, 1 Corinthians 13, Jesus’ sermon on the mount, the Book of James, and other specific parts of the Bible.





For a comprehensive study of Sam Shoemaker’s role in the Steps, Big Book, and Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, see Dick B., New Light on Alcoholism: God, Sam Shoemaker, and A.A. 2d ed (http://www.dickb.com/newlight.shtml)





END



Dick B., PO Box 837, Kihei, HI 9753-0837; 808 874 4876; dickb@dickb.com; http://www.dickb.com/index.shtml