A New Way In
Reaching the Heart of a Child of God in Recovery with His Own, Powerful Historical Roots

Pioneer AAs built their house on a rock: the truth in the Good Book; they invented nothing new. They quit drinking and resisted temptation; relied on God; abandoned evil behavior; grew in fellowship with the Father; and reached out in love and service to others still suffering. In Akron and Cleveland, they attained a documented 75 to 93% success rate among seemingly hopeless, medically incurable alcoholics who really tried. They followed simple principles from the Salvation Army, Christian Endeavor, Rescue Mission, Oxford Group, and YMCA leaders who charted the course. This book will persuade you that, if you show the child of God these truths today, he’ll stick with A.A. and the Steps, ignore idol worship and religious criticism, and bring the truth about our Creator’s healings, liberty, forgiveness, and love to the front-line struggles for sobriety and cure in an increasingly doubtful, fear-filled, unbelieving world. Each ambassador can reach the newcomer and flustered old-timer with truth. With God, nothing is impossible.

96 pp.; 6 x 9; perfect bound; 2006

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A New Way Out
New Path-Familiar Road Signs-Our Creator’s Guidance

There’s a new way out of addictions, alcoholism, and other life- controlling problems. Disappointed and discouraged, many today would abandon A.A., 12-Step programs, treatment, and therapy because of low success rates. But there is a far better way—look to the history, principles, and practices of early A.A. with its documented 75% to 93% success rate among medically-incurable alcoholics who really tried. That’s when A.A. did work. Also, look to the history, principles, and practices of the worldwide societies which spawned A.A. ideas and were highly effective—the Salvation Army, the Rescue and Gospel Missions, United Christian Endeavor Society, Young Men’s Christian Association. You will see a common thread. You’ll see it in early A.A. too. And this book will tell you about it. Then, look to the history, principles, and practices of churches, clergy, para-church, Christ-centered, and Christian recovery programs. Look to the histories of healing by religious means. Such healing dates from the Old Testament and follows through to today. When people relied upon the Creator, accepted Christ, called upon God in Jesus’ name for cure, and believed, they received. History is our product. Accurate information our specialty. Usefulness our standard. A New Way Out leads to the power of God, the name of Jesus Christ, the love of God and neighbor, and serving others. It applauds the good things in A.A. and 12-Step programs. It respects the good things in religion. It grounds you in the historical elements of recovery by the power of God, and then points you to support groups and church—armed as you will be with those elements of each that worked in the earliest days, and those that don’t work today. Include a history element in your own program. This book will give you the history. You can experience the results—the same results found in early A.A. and the other great organizations upon whose ideas it drew.

94 pp.; 6 x 9; perfect bound; 2006

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ANNE SMITH'S JOURNAL, 1933-1939
A.A.'s Principles of Success
(Third Edition)

Undoubtedly the most forgotten, least quoted, and least understood of early A.A.'s six major spiritual roots is Anne Smith's Journal. Anne Ripley Smith was the wife of A.A.'s co-founder, Dr. Bob. She was called by A.A.'s other co-founder, Bill Wilson, a "founder" of A.A. and the "Mother of A.A." It was she who read the Bible daily to Dr. Bob and Bill during the summer of 1935 when Bill was living with the Smiths and the spiritual recovery principles of A.A. were being developed. It was she, beginning in 1933, who recorded the basic ideas from the Bible, the Oxford Group's life-changing program, the Quiet Time practices, the Christian literature, and the practical ideas for depending upon God that became part and parcel of the A.A. Twelve Steps and A.A.'s Fellowship. Anne assembled these in her journal from 1933 to 1939. She read from this journal and used it as a basis for discussion from A.A.'s earliest Quiet Time days at the Smith home in Akron. Anne was declared to be the one who gave Bill W. and Dr. Bob a much needed "spiritual infusion." She attended all pioneer meetings. She acted as house-mother, nurse, evangelist, counselor, and employment agent for A.A. pioneers and their families. To know what Anne Smith wrote and was teaching is to know the real heart of A.A.'s spiritual ideas and program. This was the program that set the stage for the astonishing 75% to 93% success rate in Akron and Cleveland for "medically incurable" alcoholics who really tried and recovered. It was a program that put God and His Word first!

Foreword by Bob S., son of Dr. Bob & Anne Smith; co-author, Children of the Healer.

180 pp.; 6 x 9; perfect bound; 1998

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BY THE POWER OF GOD
A Guide to Early A.A. Groups & Forming Similar Groups Today
(Wilson House Series #3)

So . . .

You are a Christian and thinking about leaving a Twelve Step program because you get roundly trounced if you mention your faith, the Bible, or God in your group; or

You are a Christian and can't find a group in a Twelve Step program where there are like-minded believers who want to study early A.A.’s roots in the Bible; or

You are sick and tired about hearing of an “higher power” that can be a lightbulb, a tree, Santa Claus, the "group" itself, a radiator, a lizard, or Gertrude; or

You want to learn where early A.A.’s spiritual ideas really came from, and what Quiet Time, the Rev. Sam Shoemaker, the Oxford Group, Dr. Bob’s wife Anne Smith, and Christian literature contributed to the Twelve Steps; or

You just can’t understand why A.A. can have men’s groups, women’s groups, gay and lesbian groups, atheist groups, policemen’s groups, airline pilots groups, and yet there is severe and sarcastic criticism when you mention a Bible study group.

You are grateful to God, to A.A., to the Twelve Step program, and to your friends for what you found in A.A. AND YOU DON’T WANT TO LEAVE.

Can you find, does there exist, or may you start a Good Book/Big Book or A.A. Roots Group in today’s Twelve Step arena; or must you leave A.A. and go to a Christian alternative a Christ-centered Twelve Step group, or a religious fellowship?

In this book, Dick B., an active, recovered A.A., who is a Christian and a Bible student, tells you the history of A.A.’s biblical roots when it was a Christian Fellowship and achieved astonishing successes. He tells you what he and the men he has sponsored have done IN A.A. He discusses the widespread hunger in today’s Twelve Step groups for the truth about God, about Jesus Christ, about the Bible, and about how to be cured and healed by the power of God-–and still continue to help others who want to recover by that power of God. He shows you what the A.A. pioneers did. He shows you what many in A.A. today are doing with Christian retreats, Good Book/Big Books Study Groups, and historical literature, and how you can do likewise and still be an active contributor to the Twelve Step movement, and not a detractor.

Foreword by Ozzie Lepper, President/Managing Director, The Wilson House, East Dorset, VT

260 pp.; 6 x 9; perfect bound; 2000

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CURED!
Proven Help for Alcoholics and Addicts

Cured presents a new and exciting opportunity to the recovery community. The A.A. pioneers all declared that they were miraculously cured by reliance on the Creator. This title quotes their statements. It specifies all the places in early A.A. literature where the founders and their people claimed they had been cured of alcoholism. It details a program - the Program - of early A.A. that few would recognize today. The specifics were reported to John D. Rockefeller, Jr., in 1938 after a thorough investigation by his agent, Frank Amos (later an A.A. Trustee). Where, then, did the false doctrine of "no cure" originate? It certainly was not what the Oldtimers wanted, sought, and attained. Perhaps the idea of "once an alcoholic always an alcoholic" came from a therapist who was himself unsuccessful in those days. We know his book was read by the founders. But Bill Wilson substituted many strange ideas for "recovery" that certainly did not represent the experience of the early Christian Fellowship with its emphasis on the power of the Creator, on Jesus Christ, on the Bible and prayer, on Christian fellowship, and on witnessing to others. Placing his report on clear understandings of "cure" in the Bible, in Bible dictionaries, and in modern dictionaries, Dick B. calls a cure a cure; a miracle a miracle; and alcoholism alcoholism. He shows how the many conflicting and diverse definitions of alcoholism have obfuscated the cure itself. From that point on, the author illustrates what he calls "Newcomer Netting"-the vitally important, life and death emphasis of A.A. He points to the "spins" on A.A. that need to be dispelled and ignored if new people are to learn what the Creator, our Almighty God, can do for them that He also did for the Pioneers. This, he says, does not mean altering the Twelve Steps, repudiating them, or changing their purpose. It means looking at them in terms of their roots, history, and intended objective - a relationship with God. Exciting too is Dick's urging that AAs seek to fill their glass to the "full" instead of the "half empty" container of today. There are medical, religious, economic, moral, fitness, educational, vocational, and special needs that are being kept out of groups instead of being stressed as they were in early A.A. The author again, as he has done before, rejects the "goofy gods," the "nonsense gods of recovery," and points the clear necessity for Divine help that early AAs found they needed and received. For him, this means talking plainly about the Creator, just as early AAs did, and recognizing that "back to basics" really means "back to the Bible" from which A.A. took its basic ideas. With the lessons of the Good Book before them, believing AAs can expect healing, forgiveness, release from all kinds of prisons such as guilt and shame, and real deliverance. The book concludes with the author's own "Table of Tips" representing what he has found will produce the cure that he, the founders, and many before them found in the hand of God.

182 pp.; 6x9; perfect bound; 2006

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