Shining Example or Hideous Warning

Which do I want to be?

Shining Example?

or

Hideous Warning?

Do I want to be an attraction? Or do I want to beat people over the head with whatever I think my "message" is, no matter how unattractive I am making it seem?

Do I only care to be right? Do I also care to be loving in the way I treat others? Am I willing to yield every now and then in order to live in peace with those I love and those I would like to love?

Oh, I know, there are those who are so convinced that they are right in all of their convictions that they should never yield, I can recommend some other blogs for you to read, you will never be happy here, go away, OK? In fact, I read the blog of one recently, his sponsor told him that if others didn't agree with him he should tell them "to go to hell because that is where they are going anyway." Wow. That is beyond horrible.

So, you might ask, what brought this on?

I have a new visitor. I have mostly been deleting his comments. I kept one yesterday. He is another expert, and authority. He has all the answers. He comes by my blog about once a week or so to tell me that God relieved him of his alcoholism. That God did for him what he could not do for himself. I don't think he reads my blog because if he did, he would see that I wouldn't disagree with him on that. Then he leaves a link to his little website selling all the books he has written about the history of AA and his slant on it. And his strange slant on AA and how we have all got it wrong.

Does this make me want to ask him questions because I "want what he has?" um, no.

It makes me delete his comments and wish he would go away.

I pray to God that I never get so insulated in my view that I think that I have all the answers for everybody.

I have my faith in God and it is very strong. I spend a great deal of my time and energy at my church and in Biblical School - but that is MY PATH. It does not have to be yours. You just have to have your path. I have to have mine, you have to have yours. That is how AA works. And frankly, I usually write this blog with my intended audience being a stray reader who may stumble across this blog wondering about the daily life of a sober alcoholic.

I know that Dr. Bob brought his Bible to meetings at the King School. I also know that the female alcoholics fried donuts in the kitchen with the wives while the menfolk had their meetings in the front rooms back in those days. And that all worked for them. A lot has changed.

So, when someone comes by randomly and drops little bombs of comments about finding Jesus, it really irritates me. 1. It is just totally inappropriate. 2. You are barking up the wrong tree, buddy.

And 3., as my former husband used to say, Alcoholism is no excuse for bad manners.