Many years ago, I read for the very first time, the words of the Prophet Joseph Smith, [Latter-day Saints] should gather all the good and true principles in the world and treasure them up. 1

It is so thrilling to see the Church embrace the good and true principles of the 12 Steps and publish an official study guide based on them!

It is my constant prayer that as the 12 Steps continue to spread to our brothers and sisters throughout the Church, the emphasis will continue to be on using them to open a channel of communication and relationship with the Savior Jesus Christ and his atoning sacrifice. The power of the 12 steps to bring us to a mighty change of heart (and then habit) will be greatly diminished if our faith is not channeled toward Jesus Christ's saving grace. We need Him plainly, directly, personally. Anything that makes Him a peripheral figure, no matter how well-intended, is going to short-circuit our power to recover. When the very real plight of an addicted person is understood, it becomes obvious why this is so.

Those whose hope, peace, strength and potential are being consumed by an addiction (whether it be to drugs and alcohol or to sexually inappropriate behaviors or to unhealthy eating behaviors or to unwise spending behaviors, etc.) are in as desperate need of a Savior as Alma the younger was when he cried out in his heart directly to the Savior for rescue. (Alma 36:18 and Alma 38:8.) Those who are this far gone in the clutches of the Liar, Satan, have only one hope and that hope is in Jesus Christ's power to redeem them. To put it plainly, they need their attention and their hearts to be turned specifically to the Savior, the one who has been endowed by the Father with the power to save. The fall has separated us from the Father, and it is Jesus whom the Father has sent to shepherd us home to Him.

Seeing Each Step as Testimony of My Need to Anchor My Life in Christ

Not long after beginning to study the Book of Mormon to discover if the principles in the Steps were found there, I began to see that every step included a testimony of the Savior's absolute centrality in my recovery in the following way:

Step One: Establishes the truth of my absolute need for the Atoning Power of Christ–that without His Spirit with me I am lost.

Step Two: Establishes Christ's singular place in the Atoning process as the One who the Father sent to save me and to whom I must come and seek oneness with if I desire to be triumphant over the effects of the fall in my life.

Step Three: Establishes the truth that it must be by my choice, by my initiative that I look to Christ and accept His ever-present willingness to be as one with me and save me.

Step Four: Establishes the truth about what my past life has been like and how I've departed from the Savior's teachings.

Step Five: Establishes my willingness to come unto Christ by telling the truth and allowing appropriate others to know of my past weakness and my willingness.

Step Six: Establishes the truth that no part of the process of redemption is mine except the willingness to be changed; that not even my own best efforts will bring about the change of heart I need. Only Christ can change my heart and thus my disposition or personality.

Step Seven: Establishes the truth that I must come to a place like Alma the younger and like the people of King Benjamin, and surrender myself unreservedly to the power of Christ's Atonement.

Step Eight: Establishes my need to seek the Spirit of Truth in guiding me to make a list of all those I have harmed in my past, and to become humble enough to make restitution wherever I can.

Step Nine: Establishes the sincerity of my repentance by asking me to make amends to all those whom the Spirit of Christ confirms would be blessed and not further injured by my attempts at reconciliation.

Step Ten: Establishes the truth that as long as I am mortal I will have the need to retain a remission of my tendency to sin.

Step Eleven: Establishes the truth that my relationship with Christ through personal prayer and quiet meditation is maintained by “the revelations of Christ” to my soul for my personal guidance and comfort.

Step Twelve: Establishes the fact that to keep my deliverance I must carry the message that the Savior is this near and this available, one miraculous day at a time.

Being Consumed in Christ

In the Ensign, July 1989, President Ezra Taft Benson, published a First Presidency Message entitled Born of God. We are told that First Presidency Messages should hold the weight of scripture to us. Here is an excerpt from that talk:

Looking to Jesus to Live = Miraculously Doing Right

On days that I humble myself in these twelve ways, and do my best to look to Jesus to live, I find myself miraculously doing right, doing well, without striving to do right or even trying to avoid “not-right” behavior. I find, that this change of heart, is a gift that happens automatically as I express my every thought to my Friend and Savior. In other words, I am like an observer, watching my disposition be changed, not by anything I'm doing for Him, but because of what He is doing in me. I find myself living through my day without my addictive behavior without fearing or fighting to do so.

Let me try to give you a metaphor or comparison that may convey what it means to be so “consumed in Christ” that you are automatically inclined to “always remember Him” and thus “have His Spirit to be with [you]”:

Have you ever been waiting to go on a much anticipated trip? Do you remember what it was like the last few days of school before Christmas or summer vacation? Do you remember waiting for Christmas—especially when there's an almost sure chance that you're going to get that much-desired gift—that bike or play-station or puppy or pony—whatever the greatest gift you've ever imagined to that point in your life? In every one of these situations, did it take any effort to be “consumed” in what you were so excited about and desirous of?

Let me try another comparison that and this may just be the best example of all . . . Have you ever been so in love with another person that no matter what else you're doing, you're thinking about them at the same time? You go about your normal, everyday routine, but in the inner places of your heart and mind, you're remembering them? And when you lie down at night, you go to sleep thinking of that person, and when you wake up, your first desire is to share this new day with them? That is what it is like to finally enter into the all-consuming, perfect love of (from) Christ and to be consumed in love for Him. No one can teach us how to love like He can.

We “catch” the ability to love as He loves, by being consumed in the reality of His love for us. It is this love that all our mortal cravings and strivings have been a counterfeit of.

An Open Letter to My Fellow Mortals, Caught in Addiction or not:

May I conclude by sharing with you the text of a letter originally composed and shared with a fellow mortal concerning your true nature—what you were like before you took on this challenge of mortality with all its distractions and detours (temptations to replace God with something or someone else as your source of hope and strength.)

Your mind has a direct link to the same Being who created the Universe—even Jesus Christ. (D&C 93:2). It is your truest, deepest (premortal) nature to long for this connection with Him and to follow Him. In fact, even as Lehi was shown, you came into this “dark and dreary wilderness,” by following the Lord into mortality (1 Nephi 8:5-7). Cry out now, as Lehi did (v.8.). No matter how long you've wandered in darkness, the Lord longs to bless you with His perspective--His Faith, His Hope, His Peace, His Counsel, His Comfort.

You must look to Christ as the personification of the answer to your every prayer, the fulfillment of your every need. Ahead of your spouse, your friends, your professional counselors, . . . ahead of any other living soul. Only He has the words of Eternal Life (John 6:68.). His words are as one with the Father's own mind and will and words. Know that your Father in Heaven is answering your prayers through His Son Jesus Christ.

Faith in Jesus Christ (not just faith in general, not just faith in anyone or anything besides Him) opens your direct access to His Light and His grace—or in other words, to His revelations and His power to carry through with living by those revelations—can be drawn on with complete certainty. When we follow His counsel, accept His comfort, seek His word and His power to obey His word (revelations to us), then all gifts from the Father through Him, including the Holy Ghost (John 14:26; John 15:26), will be ours as is expedient in His will (D&C 18:18.)

I pray that we will all come to realize that we must—without exception, addict and family member of addict alike—work out our own salvation in only one way—by coming to Christ and being perfected in (and by) Him.