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Isn’t this what we really need? Don’t we just need enough help to get through the challenges we are facing? That wasn’t enough for me at first, though. I wanted my problems to be wiped away completely, right now. This “all or nothing” thinking-another expression of my perfectionism-was actually keeping me in my addiction. As life didn’t unfold the way I had insisted it should, I would numb my impatience through the use of pornography and masturbation.

Even in recovery, when I finally found I could petition the Lord for relief from my addiction, I was still impatient. I just wanted to ask once and be done with it. Obviously, patience had never been one of my better qualities. Why then should it seem strange to me that the same impatience I have had toward life should also manifest itself in my recovery? I had to admit I had not changed that much, not deep down inside. I was learning some marvelous principles through the Twelve Steps, but so far the changes had only reached the upper layers of my character. I still related totally to Colleen’s confession of the same feelings during her own early recovery:

That same defect [of character] that wanted instant relief from my pain-the defect that created my compulsive, addictive behavior-also wanted instant recovery. (Colleen C. Harrison, Patterns of Light: Step 3, 19)

Though I was just beginning the recovery process, I’m grateful to say I was awakening to the power of the scriptures to provide comfort and guidance. I found myself noticing how the prophets met afflictions and challenges with patience. The Prophet Joseph Smith provided me with a marvelous example, if I would be humble enough to receive it. As Joseph sat in Liberty Jail after months and years of watching the Saints go through unspeakable persecution, he longed for the Lord to show His hand in relieving their afflictions. In anguish, Joseph cried out:

The Lord had compassion toward Joseph, and comforted him with these words:

I always wanted God to be patient with my shortcomings, but gradually I realized that I also needed to have patience with Him and His timetable. I needed to be humble and meek and willing to be long-suffering, as He worked out His purposes in my life. This business of getting me through the lessons of this life really was a joint venture between God and me. I needed to trust that God knew best how to lead me through this recovery process-how much of my burden to lift and how soon.

In this spirit of trust and patience, I try now, when temptation returns, to surrender it to Him again, and then again, and still again, as many times as it takes. And with time and with patience, I find that I can be abstinent, one day at a time. I hadn’t realized before how essential to recovery the virtue of patience was, but I find that it is indeed a central principle:

One step at a time, I am learning to trust God with my life, and I am coming to know for myself the truth of the Lord’s promise given through President Ezra Taft Benson:

Men and women who turn their lives over to God will discover that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can. He will deepen their joys, expand their vision, quicken their minds, strengthen their muscles, lift their spirits, multiply their blessings, increase their opportunities, comfort their souls, raise up friends, and pour out peace. Whoever will lose his life in the service of God will find eternal life (see Matt. 10:39). (Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson [1988], 361)

I know this truly is the Lord’s promise, for I am seeing these blessings in my own life. The Lord has helped me through so many difficulties. Even if further trials and afflictions come, I know the Lord will be with me in those as well, and so I declare with Job, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him” (Job 13:15).

The Very Personal Nature of Jesus’ Feelings for Us

As I continued to ponder the Lord’s reasons for letting me struggle with addiction, an amazing truth began to dawn on me. I began to see that the Lord didn’t just want a change in my behavior. He wanted me, and not just for now, but for always. One of the most powerful and most comforting witnesses I have received from the Lord in all this long, painful journey of recovery, is this: He misses me. Jesus is my older brother, who through eons of time has known and adored me. I trusted and adored Him. I sat at His knee in the eternal courts and learned from Him as one of my most influential teachers.

I sense that, with great interest, Christ has watched me grow through all the long ages of preparation for this life. He has also sorrowfully watched me stumble and fall as I have gone through this mortal probation, and has ached with my pains and wept with my sorrows. And after all this, it is now time for me to come back to Him. He is calling me, inviting me. But He doesn’t want to just give me some quick help, so that once healed I can run off to play and never think of Him again. His power is real in my life, each and every time I ask for it, but it is designed to be short-lived in order to encourage me to reach for Him daily, to stay near Him and continue to learn directly from Him. He wants me, my entire person, to come to Him so that He can make me a new person.

Christ says, “Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down.Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked-the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.” (Elder Robert L. Backman, quoting C. S. Lewis, Ensign, Nov. 1991, 10)

The Lord has so much more in mind for me than I first imagined! And the surrender required is a much greater surrender than I first anticipated. I was thinking much more along the lines of surrendering a little bit here and a little bit there. The truth is, that kind of surrender never freed me from addiction. Step Three says, “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.” The first thing I was willing to turn over to Him was my addiction, my temptations. But the Lord wanted more. He wanted me to turn my whole will over to Him, and eventually my whole life, my whole self. I have learned that the key to my ability to access the Lord’s help is my willingness to continually surrender my life to Him.

If I read the scriptures with open eyes, I see how the Lord, in His incomparable love, constantly reaches out to help us:

The Savior truly loves each and every one of us. It was this great love that enabled Him to carry out His marvelous Atonement for all mankind, and this love permeates and inspires His concern for us today. His love is everywhere in the scriptures. Pondering the word of the Lord in a spirit of love and trust will open an unfailing storehouse of help and support to each of us.

Making the Most of This Chapter

Please take time to answer the following questions in your recovery journal.

1.   Write about your willingness to practice patience as a tool of recovery. How are you blessed by being patient with the struggles addiction presents?

2.   Write about the level of trust you have in the Lord’s ability and willingness to meet your needs if you let Him direct your life. Do you believe you will be happier if you follow Him? How far do you need to come to believe the promises President Benson made to us?

3.   When the Savior appeared to the Nephites after the destruction of their lands, He said: “O all ye that are spared because ye were more righteous than they, will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may heal you?” (3 Nephi 9:13). Write about your willingness to be healed by the Savior. What do you need to do to contribute toward that healing?

4.    The Savior told the Nephites: “Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will come unto me ye shall have eternal life. Behold, mine arm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive; and blessed are those who come unto me.” (3 Nephi 9:14). Picture yourself in the crowd that heard these words. Where would you be standing in the crowd? Write about your feelings for the Savior. Would you approach Him? Why or why not? What would He say if He were talking just to you?

5.    The apostle John wrote: “Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not” (1 John 3:6). Have you had the experience of finding that temptations were lowered when you were closer to the Lord? Write about this experience, or about some time you felt help in resisting temptation. What was the source of that help?

Next Week-Chapter 8: Step Four

Clean Hands, Pure Heart by Philip A. Harrison, and its companion LDS 12 Step book, He Did Deliver Me from Bondage by Colleen C. Harrison, are available at most LDS bookstores and can be ordered online at www.ldscloseouts.com or www.rosehavenpublishing.com