Our situation as a people coming out of sexual slavery is not unlike the story of the people coming out of bondage from Egypt. Years of enslavement brought them to utter despair, crying out to God for help. Through an amazing series of events, they were led out—often kicking and screaming in unbelief—only to find themselves wandering in the wilderness. Free at last, on the outside, they soon discovered the harsh reality that theirs was a spiritual malady inside. The severity of withdrawal brought back the craving for the old way of life.

We may leave our Egypt, but it still has a piece of us.

Where Is SA Today?

As we view SA’s entire history from 1981 to the present, we see that many, if not most, of those who have attended meetings still prefer their Egypt. Risking the exodus is just too scary! Others have made it out into the wilderness of sobriety, only to find that mere sobriety is not enough. It is a wilderness! We sense the dread of seeing ourselves which working the Steps reveals, and we retreat to the presumed comfort of trying to control and enjoy. Like grain sown on rocky soil, many seem to spurt into life only to die out sooner or later. A very few learn to walk the wilderness by faith and not by sight, one step at a time, cross over their river Jordan, and engage the enemy one battle at a time, following the Victor who leads the way. They’ve discovered there is a promised land and One who “satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness.”

Hundreds of SA groups and thousands of members, yes. That’s SA today. Newcomers coming in through the doors, yes—in some cities, coming in droves. Running the organization better and better, yes. But what percentage of all those who ever attended your group stayed to grow in sobriety and recovery?

And more significant than the revolving-door or slipper syndromes is SA’s powerlessness over lust. How “impossible” it is. Think of it—the sheer overpowering force of just the memory of one past sexual encounter, coursing through our soul more intoxicatingly than an injected drug—and we’re off and running! That’s what we’re up against.

Why are most of us still under the tyranny of lust? Why so much slipping—and among “true believers”? Why is our sobriety, such as we may have, so fear-driven instead of love- and joy-driven? People often wonder whether this individual or that is in recovery; the question comes up all the time, whether we voice it or not. But when is an SA group not in recovery and what percentage of the whole do they represent? The situations I’ve heard about and witnessed over the years do not paint a rosy picture.

It was only a couple of years ago that a traveling member went to SA meetings from city to city over the U.S., despairing of what he described as the widespread lack of sobriety and recovery. He finally arrived at one of SA’s largest and oldest established areas, only to discover the sad reality of its sickly condition. This jarred him to action, for his own survival, and the result jarred some of the locals into taking corrective action.

The problem is, we as groups seldom ask ourselves our true condition. And how can a group see its own reality without some external reference? How can we know we’re missing the mark if we don’t see the mark or know what it is? Groups have a way of remaining self-centered, just as we individual members do.

As I see it, we are hardly at the beginning of victory over lust within ourselves, much less SA as a whole, not to mention even touching the sexaholism in our culture.

But isn’t this what we think SA claims to promise?

So we are forced to ask: Has SA ever had a spiritual awakening? Has SA ever had a spiritual awakening? 

What to Do?

It is extremely important that we find out and face honestly where we really are and where we are not. Today.

We have three choices: 1) We can continue blithely on, just as we are, no matter what our condition might be. 2) We can let ourselves get fooled into thinking that since we’re going such great guns organizationally we’re really okay. 3) As the sign at the railroad tracks says, we can Stop, Look, and Listen. We can take our own inventory. And now might be the very best time to do it!

If recovery for the sexaholic is impossible without a searching and fearless moral inventory, and if group recovery is impossible without searching and fearless group inventory, how can SA recover without its own searching and fearless inventory? Or is SA in denial? In denial over its true powerlessness to bring about recovery? Are we acting as though we have The Answer, when in reality it is so poorly demonstrated in our collective experience? Are we really satisfied with the way things are? Is your group? Are you?

Let’s Take Our SA Inventory.

I propose that we call for a year of inventory. That we set aside time in our international and regional conventions. Let’s augment that with reports in Essay. We can ask the right questions to uncover the problems, then work together toward solution. What percentage of sobriety and long-term recovery do we have? What is recovery? Are we progressing in victory over lust? What is it? Are our marriages getting better? Sex without lust? Optional at that? Is there healing in our families? Are there any intra-fellowship amends that need to be made? Are what any of us are or are doing holding SA back? Let’s measure our fellowship against each of the Twelve Steps and Traditions. If not you and I and our group, who? If not now, when?

Does anyone feel the force of this? Any takers? Any ideas?

If we take refuge in our numbers or organization, or even in our leaders, literature, or principles, we will fail. God is SA’s only refuge and strength! Since 1981 and before. Since Egypt! We have been called out. This is the incredible miracle of our time and condition.

Let us be faithful to our calling. But how? Where is SA today? Are we still wandering in the wilderness? Better to find out now. So SA can begin working the Steps of recovery.