Celebrate Recovery

About a month ago I went and hung out with the family of Julie Goodale, a girl I played soccer with at Western Baptist. It was her aunt and uncle and their two kids. Well, we got to talking about things and I mentioned that I had a real passion for working with kids struggling with addiction. Turns out the next day at church the couple was asked to help start a "Celebrate Recovery" group at their church in Cary, NC. A few days later I got an email asking if I was interested and I jumped on the opportunity. So tonight I had my first meeting about the possibility of helping out and it turns out that I will be co-leading the women's group with Julie's aunt.

So keep us in your prayers this next month and a half - Feb. 1st will begin a sort of 30 days of prayer, which will be followed by 30 days of leaders training where we will meet together and go through the material once a week or so. Then its promoting and getting it all started. Eventually as the group grows and becomes consistant we will get people through the program who can then become leaders themselves. Eventually when it gets big enough there will not just be a men's and women's group but under those heading you will have a small group for many different addictions.

This recovery idea was started by John Baker of Saddleback church in California (Rick Warren is the head pastor there). Rick says in a quote from the website,
"What we need is a biblical and balanced program to help people overcome their hurts, habits and hang-ups. Celebrate Recovery is that program. Based on the actual words of Jesus rather than psychological theory, our recovery program is unique, and more effective in helping people change than anything else I've seen or heard of. Over the years I've witnessed how the Holy Spirit has used this program to transform literally thousands of lives at Saddleback Church and help people grow toward full Christlike maturity."

http://www.celebraterecovery.com