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April 7 - Gratitude That Reaches Back · The Daily Ripples Podcast

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  Welcome back to the Daily Ripples podcast, where we are at the intersection of faith and recovery.
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  Every day we give a stone of truth and we talk about the practical and the spiritual ripples.
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  And, you know, we could probably keep going with those ripples until eventually they become a wave and reshaping the shoreline of our lives,
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  as that original intro that we used to use always said.
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  But our Daily Ripple for today, April 7th, is gratitude that reaches back.
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  We start with the stone. No life is built alone. Behind every step forward are unseen prayers,
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  sacrifices, and steady hands that have held us up when we were weak. Gratitude widens when I
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  remember who helped me stand. The first ripple is practical. Today, I will acknowledge those who
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  supported me—spouse, family, friends, mentors. I will not treat their faithfulness as background
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  noise. A word of thanks, a note, a quiet expression of appreciation honors what they carried for me.
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  The second ripple is spiritual. When I recognize the people the Father placed in my story,
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  the Holy Spirit forms humility and connection in me. I begin to see that God's care often arrives
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  through human hands. As I follow Christ's example of honoring others, my gratitude expands into love
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  and faithfulness. And as always, we will save our prayer for the end of the episode.
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  To me today, I think that one of the best things that we can do with this particular episode,
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  Corey, is to turn this into a gratitude fest. In other words, you know, because for me,
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  as I think about this, I think about immediately as I was reading it, thought about all the people
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  in my recovery journey, in my faith journey, that I am thankful we're there. And, you know,
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  I talked, I believe it was yesterday, about my first sponsor, Steve Davis, and I'm definitely
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  grateful for his life, his example, his time in recovery, his willingness to work with me
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  at the time when I needed it. I mean, you were talking recently, and I don't know if it was on
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  the pod or off the pod, and we were talking about how, you know, people see when you, as a sponsor,
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  spend, you know, two plus hours sitting down with a fellow man in the program, reading through the
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  book, working through the steps and whatnot. And it really got me thinking about Steve as well,
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  about how he spent so much time not only going through the book with me, but just in those early
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  days back in 2013 and 2014, just doing life with me. And he turned into such a really close friend.
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  I mean, we would go out. I always say he taught me how to crash a motorcycle, but that's a story
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  for another day. But he's the first one that I think of when I think of this topic of gratitude.
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  Is there anybody that immediately first comes to mind for you, Corey, my faithful co-host here,
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  as we think about this gratitude that reaches back in our stories?
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  Oh, man, Michael, I don't want to be a Debbie Downer. Goodness. Where did gratitude list come
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  from? You know, it was handed on to me by other people in the program. Like, I can't tell you that
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  I found it in a book or anything, but I do know that, you know, it's very, this concept of gratitude
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  and giving thanks is extremely scriptural. So I can come at it from a scriptural perspective all
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  you want. Yeah, no, no, go for it. No, I want a scriptural. Right, right. But in terms of the
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  recovery materials, you know, it's kind of baked in there in certain places, but a gratitude list
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  in and of itself, and again, I didn't say we're doing a gratitude list today, Corey. I just said,
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  let's talk about the people that we're grateful for.
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  Well, and I'm getting there.
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  I'm getting there.
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  But, you know, I was, because, you know, I've heard this in the rooms for years.
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  Ever since I was 17, somewhere in there.
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  Started hearing my gratitude list.
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  So a long time ago, basically, because you're getting old, man.
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  Not yet.
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  But the reason I say that is because, you know, this thing that is in this literature, the big book, that literature, it says, selfishness, self-centeredness, that is the root of my troubles.
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  And then for some reason, man, this is why I'm not trying to be this Debbie Downer now, but when I hear about gratitude list and I think about what that action is,
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  it's almost like an action of me sitting down and writing everything I got.
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  And I'm not trying to say that's selfish, but at some degree.
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  And somebody pointed out to me some years ago, and they said,
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  Corey, instead of going and writing about everything you've got,
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  maybe go do something for somebody that you got on that list.
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  Instead of just writing, and that's what on my notes on this piece of paper,
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  that's what popped out to me.
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  It said, not just on a list.
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  Because it says, today I'll acknowledge those who have supported me.
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  And, you know, so I think about my mother a lot.
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  I think about the people that I love, my son, the mother, his mom too.
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  Let me show them acknowledgement in real life rather than on this list.
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  How important that is for me to go do the dishes, for me to call her probably after this and say,
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  hey, do you want him to come over an extra day so you can have some extra time to yourself?
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  Because she has two daughters of her own.
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  And, you know, and that brings me to this thing of to actually do the work and expressing that through service.
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  And that's what I was going with.
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  But also to go with what I'm grateful for is probably, man, everything and everybody and everything that's ever touched me in my life.
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  Yeah, and I think that is the power at times of a gratitude list, because even though, you know, you have that certain perspective of it,
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  whenever I have taken the time to go through and write out a gratitude list, because there was a time in my life of recovery,
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  and this was before I was a pastor, this was early on in recovery, I got to, I think it was about year three of my recovery,
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  And I was just kind of down all the time.
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  You know, everything was just abysmal.
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  It was, you know, I was definitely that kind of Debbie Downer mentality during that time.
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  That was the time around the time when a guy with 30 years more sobriety than I had told
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  me that, well, maybe I just needed to take the cotton out of my ears and put it in my
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  mouth sometimes and listen to what other people had to say.
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  You know, that was the first time I really kind of heard that phrase or that it stuck,
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  I guess I would say.
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  But when I was going through for myself and during that time, my sponsor told me, well, write out a gratitude list and keep it simple.
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  No more than five things.
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  Tape it to your mirror.
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  And then every morning when you wake up, look at it, read it.
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  And to start my day with gratitude instead of starting my day with dread, with, you know, all this thing.
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  So it was a tool for a particular time and place in my recovery journey.
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  But I also think that to use modern language, you know, this whole thing is about love when you get right down to it.
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  We do the 12 steps as an act of self-love.
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  We learn how to serve others as an act of love.
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  And through it all, we learn how to love and serve our higher power.
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  But a key component of love is that gratitude and that thanksgiving for not only those that
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  you give love to, but those who extend love to me.
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  And because it is a circle, it's a process, you know, everybody is involved in it.
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  And I think about the story, you know, in the Gospel of Luke, where Jesus had healed,
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  you know, a bunch of people, but only one of them, it says, turned around.
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  And it starts in Luke 17, beginning in verse 15.
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  It said,
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  One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice.
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  He threw himself at Jesus' feet and thanked him.
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  And then the gospel tells us, and he was a Samaritan.
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  So, and that part about, and he was a Samaritan, is critical.
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  Because the Samaritans at the time, to Jewish people, who everybody in the gospels, by the way, if you didn't know, just about everybody in the gospels were Jewish people, including Jesus himself.
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  But the Samaritans were essentially, they were the outcasts.
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  They were the outsiders.
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  When you see Samaritan in the Bible, think along the lines of crackhead, pothead, smackhead, people that society had cast aside.
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  That's your Samaritan, right?
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  And it was one of those kind of people, the only one out of the people that were healed who came back to thank Jesus was the one that society said was the outcast and wasn't worth a whole lot.
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  And that's why I think it's important for us to express our gratitude through words, through writing, through whatever manners or mechanisms we have, because that shows that it's real.
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  And to use modern language, people have different love languages, as it were.
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  For some, acts of service are their love language.
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  And for others, words of affirmation are their love language.
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  Both of them are a love language and both of them have value.
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  Well, I like this part in here.
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  It says, I begin to see that God's care often arrives through human hands.
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  I was sitting down with a man one day and we were talking and he was talking about the devil.
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  And, you know, I'm not too good with this kind of language either.
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  And I was telling him, I said, well, do you think that everything is God?
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  Or do you think that some things are not and some things are God?
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  And he said, well, you know, the bad things I did was definitely not God and the good things I did was definitely God.
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  And I said, so every drink and everything that it ever took me to get here got me sitting down with you right here today.
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  So is right here with you today God?
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  He said, yeah.
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  I said, well, what about everything it took for me to get here?
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  He said, well, he came to this pause, right?
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  And so when I look at just everything, you know, I think the more and more we do this, the more and more awake we become and the more we can see the puzzle, right?
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  I don't know the whole puzzle, but I can see how.
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  See the pieces, yeah.
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  Right.
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  You know, because my first sponsor, Doug, used to sponsor Bill.
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  Well, Doug passed away.
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  And, you know, just that connection and to know how close he is to me and my life today, I look at all these different pieces.
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  I just properly laid, and you couldn't have, the best way I can describe it is this.
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  Someone was talking about amends, and they said, well, you know, going back and finding all these people in the world, that would be crazy.
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  it'd almost be like cutting a pillow full of feathers open on top of the Empire State Building
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  and finding all those feathers. And the person responded and said, well, what if God made all
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  those feathers and God went and helped you found each and every single one of them? Would it be
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  possible then? And that, to me, is the beautiful thing of this life, right? Because God is in
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  everything, in every little piece, in everything that we touch, too, if it's with love. I think
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  that's the biggest thing today. If it's with love, I can see it and I can be present with it. And we
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  were talking about meditation not too long ago. I think about meditation because it keeps me in the
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  present, right? And if I can follow that breath, it keeps me right now. But maybe I get outside of
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  that breath a little bit. Start thinking about penguins and, you know, penguins going down in a
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  bowling alley or this over here or airplanes with skunks on them for some reason. I don't know why
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  they got out skunks, but this airplane I got in my head has a skunk. But I don't beat myself about
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  getting out of rhythm of that. I just go back to my breath. And I think that's a good analogy for
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  how I try to live in my life in prayer, right? I can get out of prayer a little bit. I can get out
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  of sorts, but I don't beat myself up about it. I'd come back into this topic of gratitude for
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  everything, for everything being God in this world that I'm living in. Anyways, that's what I was
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  thinking about. I'm sorry. Yeah, and just to add a little, you know, nuance to that, and I just want
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  to be, you know, clear from my perspective, is that I don't believe that God, you know, is the
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  author or causes the bad or the evil of this world, but I do believe and affirm that God can use the
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  bad and the evil that we do for the glory of the kingdom, because He uses it through our, to use
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  recovery language through our experience, strength, and hope. The experiences that I had, even if it
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  was me causing bad or me causing evil, the experiences that I've had, like you astutely
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  pointed out, have led me to where we are right here today, trying to do something good. So God
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  uses our experiences, and He calls people who are many times, and I'm the chief among those,
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  unqualified for the role that He has called us to, but then He qualifies us. He works what we
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  Methodists call sanctifying grace within us, what we call, you know, in the program, learning to
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  practice these principles in all of our affairs. It's different language for talking about the same
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  mystical work that God does within us that forms our character, forms our strength over time,
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  so that we are better able to love God and to love others as we love ourselves.
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  You might think this is funny, but I was thinking about this the other day,
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  and I was thinking about free will, right?
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  Absolutely. That's part of it, too.
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  But free will, I started really getting the best.
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  Because what if I never had the choice?
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  What if I always had the thought, but I never made the choice behind it?
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  Because maybe will those thought.
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  And maybe I have, yes, I do have free thoughts.
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  But for some reason, going back to choice, right?
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  Yeah, I knew you were going to do it.
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  But, you know, me and a friend of mine, we get really into this talk because, you know, Michael, I've made decisions.
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  This was my previous tenure in recovery, but I've made decisions that were so selfish.
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  Like, you know, I could be with dating a girl sober, and I get this other girl texting me.
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  And then without even, you know, rationalizing good and bad, I just go make this choice and do this bad thing.
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  Right?
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  Yeah.
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  So when I think about choice, I don't know, because I do have these thoughts that, hey, this is how I want to be.
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  But for some reason, and this aligns with the big book, my morals, my philosophical convictions never could come together.
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  Right.
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  And maybe that is the spiritual malady of, you know, maybe I believe that people like me have a little bit, maybe that's my ego trying to rationalize this a little bit.
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  But for some reason, because I look back in my life, I've always had this spiritual malady.
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  I've always felt different than everybody else and not a part of.
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  And maybe everybody feels that.
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  And I just said, I'm definitely not going to feel like this.
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  and I jumped into the drugs and alcohol.
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  But I, yeah, I don't know, because did I ever have a choice?
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  And if I did, where did I make the wrong one to lead me down a path of destruction and mayhem?
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  That's a good question for you, I guess.
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  And I don't know that I have the right answer for that, you know,
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  because that's part of where I say, and maybe this is the clergy cop-out coming in,
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  So just be fair warning, but I'd say that's part of the mystery of our faith.
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  We don't always know exactly how all this works.
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  And so, and for some people, you know, especially today in the modern age where you can learn,
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  you can study, you can dissect, you can find the root cause of everything.
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  We're not used to sitting in a mystery or sitting in an unknown.
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  And that is an unknown to a certain extent that, you know, how do these things happen?
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  You know, what is the balance between, you know, our free will and how we've learned to act and choices that we have?
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  But, I mean, clearly we all have a choice as to where to direct and exercise our will,
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  because if we had zero choice in it, then as soon as someone learned and heard the 12 steps,
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  they'd be recovered and freed because they don't have a choice anymore because they know about it and now they have to do it.
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  But you still have a choice as to whether or not you do the steps and you do the program.
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  But even when we fail, even when we stumble, even when we don't get it wrong, kind of like
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  what you alluded to earlier, all of the in, the out, the back, the forth, the having some
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  years of sobriety, then going back out and relapsing, all of those things are used as
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  part of your story today to enable you to be a more effective vessel or reflection of God's
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  will and love to the other men that you come into contact with.
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  So I think that at the end of the day, whether it's a choice or not a choice, as long as we are faithful, as long as we are working toward a common goal, that we're going to be on the right track.
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  I like this passage on page 125 in the 12 of the 12.
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  It kind of goes along with everything we just talked about.
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  It says,
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  For it is only by accepting and solving our problems that we begin to get right with ourselves and with the world about us and with him who presides over us all.
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  Understanding is the key to right principles and attitudes, and right action is the key to good living.
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  That's pretty cool.
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  Absolutely.
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  And with all of that, I think that back into the gratitude that reaches back, and clearly we did not in the past 18 or 20 minutes here go down a gratitude list approach, which to be clear, I never said at the beginning.
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  I just said, you know, what are we grateful for?
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  But you did cover it.
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  You're grateful for all of your experiences that have led you here, just as I am.
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  And so let's close out today with our word of prayer.
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  Corey, would you do us the honors?
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  Yeah, Father, thank you for the people you have woven into my life.
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  Teach me to honor them with sincere gratitude and help me become a source of strength for
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  others as well.
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  Amen.
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  Amen.
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  Amen.