Product Description

Here's a very special book for those who want to rely on the power of God for healing and cure of alcoholism and addiction, want to join others of like mind, and also want to gather as a study group that resembles and uses early A.A. principles and practices. This book tells you how the A.A. pioneers got well. It makes many specific suggestions as to how to conduct a study group, what the topics can be, what the leader should do, what the resources can be, and how the group can organize and proceed. It is a very practical guide being used by many groups today. Some operate as A.A. groups. Some as church groups. Some as recovery groups. Some as Big Book, or Bible or Twelve Step study groups--and even all three together. Some fellowships are conducted with the help of a church, a professional, or a garden variety drunk. Some have even called themselves The James Club which was the name the early AAs wanted to give to the A.A. Society at the time the Big Book was being written. They favored study of the Book of James in the Bible. So did Bill Wilson. And Dr. Bob and his wife mentioned it frequently. Here is a guide you can use for yourself, for a meeting, for a group, for a church, or for a recovery program.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #827882 in Books
• Published on: 2000-05-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 260 pages

Review
Author Dick B. begins with his own tentative and defiant entry into AA and lets us learn as he learned and healed. Then he takes us into the minds and writings of the founders and early stalwarts of AA. Next, he puts together the Source, the history and the Steps to show how inextricably they are entwined. And finally he discusses the desire he sees for groups like the early Pioneer Groups whose meetings were based in a combination of Bible study and AA, and he provides some guidelines to create such groups. Another fine book in his growing list of such achievements.... -- Audrey DeLaMartre, The Phoenix, March, 1999

From the Publisher
This new title the 15th by A.A.'s "unofficial historian" Dick B. answers the growing hunger for information as to how and why today's Twelve Step programs lost God in favor of some nebulous "higher power" or no belief at all. It examines what early A.A. meetings were like, shows how they focused on God for help, discusses the roots of A.A. in the Bible and Christian literature, shows how the Biblical roots fed into the Twelve Steps and A.A. fellowship, and then shows the profit today and the feasibility today for a return by those Aas who desire to do so, and not leave A.A., to organize and conduct A.A. groups were God is welcome, the Bible is studied, and Jesus Christ is not a forbidden name. In short, it makes the case for freedom within today's A.A. to espouse and rely upon the very ideas that made early A.A. so astonishingly successful.

From the Author
The delight in our new millenium has been the number of groups that have started up within A.A., based on the suggestions in The Good Book and The Big Book: A.A.'s Roots in the Bible and this companion book: By the Power of God. There are now groups in Florida, California, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Kansas, Missouri, and New York, with more on their way. Each group is autonomous and selects its own format which may include Bible Study, Big Book Study, Step Study, A.A. History Study, Prayer, and Guidance periods,usually following the guidelines of the early AAs in Akron. It is exciting to see this happening. It is not for all AAs, but it is a breath of fresh air for those who have tired of "any god," a "higher power that is a lightbulb," "spiritual, but not religious," and the arid wasteland that eliminates our Creator, the Good Book, Jesus Christ, the gift of Holy Spirit, and the teachings in the Book of James, 1 Corinthians 13, and Jesus sermon on the mount (Matthew 5, 6, and 7) which were the heart of early A.A. and were considered "absolutely essential," according to Dr. Bob as quoted in A.A.'s own literature. Christians should find the possibilities exciting. Those who want to move toward God, the Bible, and Jesus Christ will find much comfort that is not found in the increasingly "not god" that is emerging in our meetings and literature today.

Customer Reviews

The revival of interest in this book deserves an additional review
Two reviewers have already praised both the purpose and content of Dick's book on the power of God and how groups can once again tap into that power despite A.A.'s ever-increasing drift toward idolatry, nameless spirituality, and absurd names for a deity. When this book was first written, it was used to encourage and help people get started studying healing by divine means, and studying it within the 12 Step Fellowship ranks--just as the early AAs did. Since that time, more and more books have been coming out with specific references to the importance of reliance on God, Bible study and prayer--within the fellowships themselves. This book turns us back to the close of Dick's initial research on A.A.'s Biblical roots and history and his decision to write materials on how to use the history in one's own program, in groups and meetings, in study fellowships, and in teachings. Its value grows as the interest in help from God is beginning to resurface in recovery. Note how many treatment programs are now incorporating "Christian Track" segments. And if they add A.A.'s own Christian history to these Christian Tracks, they can produce winning results with Dick's book as one of their guides.

What Gems of Truth I Gleaned from this Insightful Book!
The grief implicit in alcoholism and other addictions is treated gently in this look at how God/Christianity influenced the A.A. Groups of the past, and continues to do so today. This is an honest, clear-headed, and carefully researched book well worth reading. I loved this book from page one!

An Excellent Study of Early AA and Christian Influences
Dick B. has performed a great service in writing this guide to early A.A. Groups and conducting similar groups today. He puts in print what many of us have recognised as the biblical and Christian roots in the 12 Steps and the Serenity Prayer. He shows how the early meetings were conducted and gives guidance for conducting similar meetings today; such as Serenity Groups.

Of special note is the MUST emphasis that early AA members placed on maintaining a daily Quiet Time. When I wrote the book _Prayer Steps to Serenity_, I very consciously took the same approach of early AA by writing daily devotions and prayers that encourage readers to keep on praying and take time to Listen To God. As I wrote in _Prayer Steps to Serenity,_ "During your Quiet Time...pray for God's guidance and power to help you that day and in the coming days. Write your own devotional on the Step, and perhaps share it in your next group meeting or with your friends." Dick indicates that Anne Smith, Dr. Bob's wife, did this in her Journal, which she shared with others in AA meetings.

Dick B. emphasizes that those in early AA recovered from alcoholism and other addictions by the power of God. So can we, no matter what our addiction or compulsion. Dick's book, _By the Power of God_, gives us many good reasons to read good devotional books and spend time in prayer! Thanks, Dick, for a great job and for all the other AA books that you have written too! I am highly recommending your book to everyone!

Thanks for Reading!
L.G. Parkhurst, Jr.
Author: Prayer Steps to Serenity the Twelve Steps Journey: New Serenity Prayer Edition ISBN: 0977805387
PrayerSteps.org