Purpose of a Step Study

The seminar in Columbus last week was an outstanding success. It was great to see the Regional Director and the State Representatives of the North East Region assisting participants from across the nation as several states were represented.

Great to hear many commit to follow the model as they start or grow this ministry in communities across the country. As previously noted, a large part of that commitment is to remain faithful to the curriculum and process that has helped countless thousands around the world.

We're continuing to look at John Pollard's essay "Why Does It Take So Long to Finish a Step Study?", and why every ministry leader should commit to working the basics that have served the ministry well.

The Purpose of the Step Study

For some the word "study" in "Step Study" and presence of "lessons" leads them to view the Participant Guides primarily as devices for learning about recovery. Learning the principles and steps of recovery is important. Each lesson contains an acrostic with supporting Scriptures to help the participant think about the truths to be applied in their lives. But a Step Study goes far beyond communicating content.

If recovery was simply a matter of obtaining the right information and hearing the right Bible verses Celebrate Recovery could be reduced to the lessons shared in the Large Group time. In reality, recovery requires each participant to move through the steps as the Holy Spirit carries out His unique work of healing the heart.

The four Participant Guides are designed to "create movement through the steps"[1] not merely movement through the material. This movement through the steps must be the work of the participant himself as God's Spirit brings conviction, understanding and hope. Forcing or rushing that "movement" puts a CR leader in a place that belongs to God alone. Group leaders must be on guard against the pitfall of becoming one half of another codependent relationship.

Paul assures us that to each believer "the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good." These spiritual gifts are perfectly distributed among believers by the Holy Spirit "just as he determines" (1 Corinthians 12:7, 11). Any highly experienced Step Study leader will tell you that each Step Study group is unique.

God's sovereignty extends to how He will work through very diverse individuals in unique ways each time a Step Study group is formed. It is vital that we avoid pushing participants and allow God adequate time and freedom to work.

One way to resist the temptation to develop "accelerated" Step Study groups is to deepen your understanding of the purpose of a Celebrate Recovery Step Study—

[1] Leader's Guide, p. 30. Pastor John Baker also emphasizes this in every One Day conference and at every annual Summit.

Next week we'll look at Opportunity, Community, and Character.

Celebrating Recovery, each day in Christ! - Jim

Need Senior Pastor Support?

Here's what one Senior Pastor said about Celebrate Recovery:

"My Dad always said it’s best to work hard but also to work smart. A wise pastor searches for ministry tools and programs that apply that principle to produce healthy people. Why? Because congregations and communities are looking for safe venues to deal with their hurts, habits, and hang ups….places that work hard and work smart at helping folks find answers to life.

When people discover a Christ centered program that identifies incremental steps they can take to make progress in their search for emotional healing and breaking bad habits they get hope. They keep coming back and experience the spiritual dynamic of “putting off the old man and putting on the new man” as only Jesus can do. The fancy theological word for that process is sanctification. The spiritual venue that engages people in the progressive work of sanctification better than any other I’ve seen is “Celebrate Recovery.”

The steps people walk through in Celebrate Recovery help them navigate the storms of life that have destroyed their potential for way too long. In the past 11 years our church has grown from 300 to 5,000+. Celebrate Recovery is the most effective discipleship program that fed the development of our healthy congregation. It rebuilds and restores hope like no other ministry program our church has in its spiritual toolbox. It continues to produce some of the greatest leaders and volunteers that serve our church.

I often say from the pulpit that every single person in our congregation would benefit from spending at least 6 months attending weekly Celebrate Recovery meetings. Without reservation I tell every pastor I know to start this ministry in their church. People will come out of the woodwork in your community and thank you for providing this life changing program. We’ve benefited from Celebrate Recovery when our church was small and also as we’ve become a mega church. So big or small, give it a shot. See what God will do when you give people a chance to work the steps to recovery, develop accountability relationships, and experience the power of God’s grace to restore."

Bill Buchholz

Senior Pastor

Family Community Church

San Jose, CA

Step Studies Continued

Friday, April 20

Last week I mentioned we would begin a review of a new essay written by John Pollard, our South Central Regional Director.

Today I’m in the Columbus, Ohio area getting ready for a One Day Seminar/Advanced Leadership Training Seminar. Pre-registration indicates we’ll have a great attendance at this event hosted by Upper Arlington Lutheran Church in Hilliard.

Part of the excitement of attending Celebrate Recovery training events is to see the excitement of people looking forward to starting this ministry to serve their church and community. Tomorrow also affords a great opportunity to introduce them to the men and women who volunteer as State Representatives across the North East Region of the United States, leaders who have experienced starting and growing this ministry in their home church.

Networking or connecting with other healthy Celebrate Recovery ministries is the best way to be sure your ministry stays on track and does not depart from the trademark of a healthy, growing group.

In this first installment, we will look at John Pollard’s introduction to the problem of short-cutting the step study process.


Why does it take so long to finish a Step Study?
John Pollard, South Central Regional Director

This has become an important question because some CR ministries are experimenting with some form of "accelerated" Step Study. Sadly, a few self-appointed "experts" are selling this approach to CR ministries around the nation. Some see this as a way to train leaders more quickly during the first year of a new ministry. Others feel pressure to move those who have just come out of drug or alcohol rehab down the road to recovery more quickly. They fear that failing to "get them through the steps quickly" increases the danger of relapse. Or, even worse, a Ministry Leader may feel pressure to "produce results," primarily numerical growth. Too many ministries in too many churches have defined success purely in terms of "nickels and noses." CR groups cannot afford to fall into that trap.

Celebrate Recovery is a movement based on a model developed and tested at Saddleback for more than sixteen years. The last five or six years have produced phenomenal growth. When I began my own local CR in the fall of 2000 only 500 Celebrate Recovery ministries were scattered across the nation. Now, early in 2007, there are more than 5,000. That's amazing growth! Our One Day conferences around the country set new attendance records every year.

As strange as it may sound, this rapid growth has occurred because most CR leaders understand they need to start slow and build a strong foundation. Celebrate Recovery deals with life and death issues. It is vital that those who lead use proven methods and provide participants in a Step Study enough time to produce a truly transformed life.

Many accelerated approaches to a Step Study fix timeframes of as little as ten to eighteen weeks. To meet these artificial deadlines some leaders "help" group members by supplying the "right answers" to the questions in the Participant Guides. In one instance a Ministry Leader provided a guide in book form to "guide" individuals through the Participant Guides. "Helping" and "fixing" will kill a recovery ministry. Whatever the rationale for a "rush-job," the product will be no more than a shadow of a genuine Celebrate Recovery Step Study.

"The DNA of Celebrate Recovery"[1] does not establish the duration of a Step Study. However, the Celebrate Recovery Leader's Guide defines a Step Study as a group that meets "together for twelve months."[2] Even a very small disciplined group that finishes in less time may miss out on many benefits experienced in a longer timeframe. Saddleback's Celebrate Recovery, with sixteen years of experience and thousands of recovery "alumni" needs to be your model if you want you CR to reach its full potential. Hundreds of churches have confirmed the value of this model, many of them for over ten years. So why are some groups trying to rush the process? There are probably two vital dimensions of Step Study groups that are misunderstood: Purpose and Place.

See you next week as we continue with “The Purpose of the Step Study”.


Celebrating Recovery, every day in Christ! – Jim
_________________________
[1] John Baker, Celebrate Recovery Leader's Guide, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), p. 32.
[1] Ibid., top of p. 48.

Step Studies

In the coming weeks, we will be taking a closer look at a new essay composed by our South Central Regional Director, John Pollard.

John's work is familiar to all from his article concerning the importance of writing and reading a Celebrate Recovery testimony. This earlier writing helped many Celebrate Recovery ministries understand the importance of screening every testimony that is given, and the need for the speaker to follow the written word. John Pollard, like many of our Celebrate Recovery leaders, had discovered the damage and distraction that can occur when a testimony gets off track.

The new essay "Why Does It Take So Long to Finish a Step Study" addresses a disturbing trend we have observed this past year. The issue is that a number of leaders have attempted to short-cut the accountability and support found in a step study group to less than one year.

Many have heard Celebrate Recovery ministry co-founder, Cheryl Baker, remark how she and a group of women purposed to push through a step study in record time. She finished her sharing by saying "it did not work, we took a year like everybody else".

See you next week as we begin to evaluate the reasons we conduct step study groups for twelve months.

Celebrating Recovery, every day in Christ! - Jim