Pastor’s Plan
1. Equip your congregation to beat substance abuse by establishing a
substance-abuse prevention team of lay people. Contact Aneisa MacDonald,
Metropolitan Drug Commission, at 588-5550 for a training plan. The MDC is
the best resource for helping you connect with qualified counselors and
professional expertise. Visit them on the web at www.metrodrug.org.
2. Incorporate prevention messages into your sermons, newsletters,
education and parenting classes, retreats, camps and other youth and
parent events.
3. Encourage and provide opportunities for training and interaction for
parents and families. The number one factor affecting an adolescent’s
decision to engage in high-risk behaviors is their parents.
4. Provide youth with skill development in affirming behavior and
self-respect necessary for making healthy lifestyle choices.
5. Select a day, a week or a month to celebrate
your congregation’s commitment to substance
abuse prevention.
6. For inspiration and advice, call Pastor Justin Phillips at Lake City
Christian Fellowship (865-426-6544). His church does a great job helping
people struggling with substance abuse issues.
Jesus Cares
And behold, two blind men sitting by the road, hearing that
Jesus was passing by, cried out, saying, "Lord, have mercy on us,
Son of David!" 31 And the multitude sternly told them to be quiet;
but they cried out all the more, saying, "Lord, have mercy on us,
Son of David!" 32 And Jesus stopped and called them, and said, "What
do you want Me to do for you?" 33 They said to Him, "Lord, we want
our eyes to be opened." 34 And moved with compassion, Jesus touched
their eyes; and immediately they regained their sight and followed
Him.
Matthew 20:30 |
Treatment and Recovery
• Train congregations to be receptive to the needs of fellow church and
community members suffering from substance abuse.
• Proactively initiate screenings and interventions, motivating the
individual with the problem to seek help.
• Provide meeting space for support groups, helping with expenses such as
coffee and literature. Hosting additional support groups for family
members and teens. Presently, there are not sufficient groups for teens
and family members.
• Give hard resources: clothing, transportation, housing for individuals
as they begin recovery.
• Be a friend as a recovering addict tries to maintain sobriety. This can
be a very lonely time. Many have lost their jobs, families and friends.
How can anyone be successful at anything in isolation?
• Develop a fund inside your congregation to sponsor treatment for
individuals in need but without adequate insurance to cover the length of
stay necessary to improve treatment outcomes.
• Provide child care during treatment and support groups. With no one to
care for their kids, some women are forced to choose between their
children and treatment, a no-win situation.
Places to Serve
12 Step Knoxville
● Home page: http://www.12stepknoxville.com/
● Contact: 1 Timothy
● Numerous 12 Step Resources for Christ Based and Conventional 12 Step Programs
● Listings for Knoxville Recovery Meetings both Christ Based and Conventional
● On-line Recovery Meetings and Chat Rooms
● Comprehensive Biblical and AA Resources (Searchable Bibles, Big Book and more)
● Recovery Media such as Streaming Radio Feeds and other Recovery News
● Downloads (Bibles, Scriptures, Big Book, Step Worksheets and other Sobriety Tools)
Helen Ross McNabb Center: 523-8695
● Children of the Rainbow – day care for children of women treated here.
Need birthday parties, activities, spend time with children.
Celebrate Recovery: Jeff and Renee Parker, 690-1387 ext. 3,
or 691-8886.
● Need counselors with recovery experience to be on referral list.
● Help set up room and greet people at meetings.
● Support group that meets at Grace Baptist - Sun. at 5 pm and Wed. at
6:30 pm
Midway Rehab Center: 522-0301 Needed for prisoners on
probation or parole:
● Mentors.
● Jobs and housing.
● Transportation to treatment center, job interviews.
● Provide space at your church
Great Starts (High-risk nursery): 521-5613
Volunteers are needed to hold babies and play with children ages 6 weeks
to 4 years in nursery/day care for children who have been exposed to
drugs/alcohol and other high-risk children. Child care is needed some
nights and weekends while the mothers are involved in treatment sessions.
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Prayer and the Compassionate Life
“Prayer is the very beat of the compassionate
heart… To pray for others means to make them part of ourselves. To
pray for others means to allow their pains and sufferings, their
anxieties and loneliness, their confusion and fears to resound in
our innermost selves. To pray, therefore, is to become those for
whom we pray, to become the sick child, the fearful mother, the
distressed father, the nervous teenage, the angry student, and the
frustrated striker. To pray is to enter into a deep inner solidarity
with our fellow human beings so that in and through us they can be
touched by the healing power of God’s Spirit. When, as disciples of
Christ, we are able to bear the burdens of our brothers and sisters,
to be marked with their wounds, and even be broken by their sins,
our prayer becomes their prayer, our cry for mercy becomes their
cry. In compassionate prayer, we bring before God those who suffer
not merely "over there," not simply "long ago," but here and now in
our innermost selves. And so it is in and through us that others are
restored; it is in and through us that they receive new light, new
hope, and new courage; it is in and through us that God’s Spirit
touches them with His healing presence…Compassionate prayer for our
fellow human beings stands at the center of the Christian life…”
Nouwen, McNeill, Morrison, Compassion, A Reflection
on the Christian Life, 1982 |
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