Excuses: “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

After Adam had blamed Eve for giving him the forbidden fruit, God  asked Eve what she had done. The above was her response (Genesis 3:12, 13). It's difficult to make a hard and fast distinction between blame and excuse. But let's work with blame admitting just a little more than “I didn't do it,” and excuse admitting “Well yes I did it but .....”

There seems to be no lengths to which we will go to avoid taking responsibility for our actions. And there seems to be a progression involved starting, as with Adam, taking no responsibility at all;  Moving, as with Eve, to admitting we did, it but pleading extenuating circumstances; Next admitting we are wrong and actually making changes; Finally making amends where appropriate. We're talking about bearing fruit worthy of repentance (Luke 3:8), and about restitution (Numbers 5:7).  

Continuing to look at these things through the lens of twelve-step-programs, we see the first step is about coming out of denial, out of our propensity to rationalize. Eve was deceived, and it seems that few of us realize just how easily we too are deceived. We can see it in others, and might even judge them for it. But the fact of the matter is that for each and every one of us it is true that 典he heart is deceitful above all things, and desperatel

It gets tested, and/or revealed in step 4, which is to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. This is a truly difficult step, and a place where many drop out of the program. The point is that in order to do this, we will likely have to live again the pain of past hurts. This will likely propel us first to blame and then to excuses. And to move fully into this step we will need to forgive. And we will need to do all this hard work before we can honestly and fearlessly look at our part. Of course we don't want to get stuck in the past, but we do need to visit it in order that, with Jesus as our higher power, it can be redeemed. And as part of this our forgiveness needs to be from the heart (Matthew 18:25). Much of this is a process, and a painful one at that. But it is a necessary one if we want to be free of the past (John 8:32)

Working the steps then helps us to figure out what is our part and what's not. We call this taking care of our side of the street. In addition to forgiving others, we need to take responsibility for our part, and to make amends when and where appropriate (Step 9). There is a lot of work to do before this step. Timing is important, for before we do our amends we likely need to show over the long haul, both to others, and to ourselves, that we really have changed. People we have hurt are likely to be skeptical, words are cheap, we need to bear fruit worthy of repentance, and producing fruit takes time (Matthew 3:8).

Father, in this bringing of the Kingdom of heaven to earth, we all have a long way to go. We need Your help Lord. Thank You, that when we fully surrender, You change even our desires, and then give us the grace to do what without You we cannot do (Philippians 2:12, 13). Thank You Lord in Jesus Name Amen