With Spirit-led recovery, you may wonder whether it is necessary to go to recovery meetings or have a sponsor, and the answer is yes and no. Yes if He tells you to, and no if He tells you it is not necessary. When you have a daily meeting with Him He acts as your sponsor and guides you toward the things and people that He wants to use in your recovery from addiction. He is your main Sponsor, but He will usually use other people and programs to help you to recover as well. The main thing is that we daily submit and cooperate with His plan for us. This means submitting to the tools and people He uses to help us to recover from addiction as well.

You must remember that without God's help, no recovery program will work to the extent that we need because God is our Creator and He knows us better than we know ourselves. We need His insight, direction, and wisdom to truly recover from the inside out. In many meetings they tend to talk about their history of addiction (drunkalogue), their latest relapse, and the rules of the program that they follow in order to recover from that particular addiction. In most meetings, you are not allowed to promote the power of Jesus Christ to overcome addiction and there exists kind of a separation between Jesus Christ and the recovery program. They us a general higher power to accommodate everyone, but the true answer to addiction recovery is found in Jesus Christ alone. When you introduce yourself at a meeting what do you say? Do you say "Hi, I'm ______ and I'm an addict or alcoholic? Well let's look at the definition for alcoholism, which you can apply to whatever addiction that has had you bound: Alcoholism - Habitual intoxication; prolonged and excessive intake of alcoholic drinks leading to a breakdown in health and an addiction to alcohol such that abrupt deprivation leads to severe withdrawal symptoms.

Now, if God has set you free from your addiction and you are no longer practicing it or relapsing, it is not necessarily accurate to tell everyone that you are still a slave to it by calling yourself an alcoholic or addict. When you stop drinking or using drugs, your body still cannot tolerate alcohol or drugs like other peoples, so as far as a long term physical and psychological disorder, yes it exists and will likely always be there, but the actual addiction to it will be eradicated by God's work. You can introduce yourself as a "delivered" or "set free" alcoholic or addict if you wish. If you have a peace about telling people you are an alcoholic or addict then that is your choice, but if you do not feel comfortable with it then you need not do it. There are many Christian recovery groups now that can accommodate and help you this way.

Sponsors can be useful as long as they are being led by God and recognize His authority over your life. Taking on a sponsor that does not know God can benefit you as far as the mechanics of a program, revealing character defects, and as a source of accountability. But if your sponsor does not see a humans need to have God's help to recover from addiction, then they will tend to see the program as their God and their counsel and reliability will be greatly limited. As you give your recovery over to the leadership of the Holy Spirit you can trust Him to bring the right people and programs into your life and to lead you away from ones that would lead you away from Him. God will lead you to true recovery from your addiction that sets you free from the inside out, so give Him your addiction problem fully today and He will guide you.