We weren’t created to live life adrift. We are supposed to live on purpose. Everyday on purpose, encourage another. On purpose, read our Bibles, on purpose, pray.
I’m slowly learning these steps in RU.
I first heard of Reformers Unanimous from my mom. Around the time of my second run in at rehab. She gave me a few pamphlets, that soon were forgotten.
Last year I remembered RU and decided it was for me. I called the church I’ve been a not so loyal member of. I was told they no longer offered the program due to lack of interest. I was devastated. But, this was my fault for not taking advantage when they ran it.
I headed to the RU website. Found the local chapters section. This was during a really bad night. I’d taken a pill, but needed to get out- go do something good. I called every church that the website showed as hosts.
And I kept hitting dead ends. They either wouldn’t answer, or it was just no longer at their church.
I finally found one, a 45 minute drive from my house. I argued with my husband, who called me a hypocrite for going after I’d been medicated.
I left anyway.
I was scared, and just prayed the entire ride, that I’d actually walk in the door. I was a few minutes late, but I made it. I walked into a beautiful church, and was greeted by the sweetest woman. I was given a booklet, called Overcomer, and a fill in the blanks sheet.
She led me to a room with a mix of men and women. It was a small room, but it was fairly full. 20 people maybe. There was a preacher that was going over the sheet, and telling which words to put in the blanks. The message was about how to deal with temptation. He was mainly going down his checklist.
When this was over, we split off into groups. Women in one room, men in the other. One girl was in charge of running our meeting, and was very kind.
None of them could believe I came alone. They all seemed happy that I did.
The girl that ran this group was a little younger than me. She was handicapped, and walked with a limp. I believe it was caused by a car accident. She proceeded to tell her story. Her drug history, and how RU changed her life and had helped her stay clean. The other women joined in with their reasons of being in the program. Very few of them were there for actual addictions. Most of them had came in support of someone else, that no longer attended.
In my research of Reformers, I’d known going into the groups, that talking about our past is not really the purpose of being there. It is meant to talk about the positives in your life from week to week. So to me, this was semi depressing. I was looking for hope, not to feel like I was at some other meetings I’d attended.
The ladies listened to bits and pieces of my story. Then they went on to take prayer requests. After prayer, they were supposed to go over completed challenges from the previous week, but no one had done the work.
Again, the people were as nice as could be. But they didn’t follow the RU program, best I could tell. This second group was supposed to be followed by a real from the Bible preaching message. This chapter instead, went straight into Happy Hour. Which is when desserts and drinks, non alcoholic obviously, were served. I left without eating.
I spent my drive home feeling down. It was not what I expected. I’m not knocking their group, it just was not for me. People had success there, and I’m happy for them! But I didn’t feel that the purpose was to have gripe sessions about every bad thing in their life. And that’s what I walked away with. Where’s the hope in that?
Granted, I don’t feel you should judge any type of meeting or church off of one visit. My head had not caught up to my heart, in my journey to sobriety.
I would stay in relapse mode for two more months, that finally ended this past January, with me very close to death.
I’m currently in RU at another church. It’s not a better one, just a better fit for me.
And I have a whole lot of faith, and just enough hope, to keep giving this current meeting place a try.
myrujourney 