My Bio - Celebrate Recovery Director

Hello brothers and sisters,

I am Bridget, ministry leader for Celebrate Recovery at Victory Church in O’Fallon. With our pastor’s support and a great group of willing leaders, I was able to bring back this ministry of healing in Christ.

This isn’t my first taste of a recovery program. Almost 4 years ago, my life felt unmanageable to the point of depression and irritability and I was not sure why or how to fix it. Because of this, I felt that doing things to help others may make me feel better no matter what my personal needs were. I did this not realizing that I should be taking care of myself as well. This began in my early childhood and as a result I became a co-dependent people pleaser.

I was raised to do for others not realizing that it was an unhealthy, one-way street in my household. I continued this path into adulthood and thought it was a normal thing to do but I eventually became so angry inside that no one really seemed to care about me going out of my way to do things for them. This caused the buildup of anger and resentment I did not realize I had until a friend of mine noticed my behavior in a different way. She had been in a secular recovery program for a few years at that point and asked me if I had any interest in trying it. I said no and that I wasn’t interested, thinking it was only for alcoholics. I was not one, however, I was raised around and lived with who were. I thought that what I experienced was a normal thing and not a problem. In my mind everyone else was the problem. They did not understand me and it was frustrating.

A year later, that friend and I ended up being neighbors. The military life has finally put us together after being physically separated for 12 long years. When we were settled, she invited me to a meeting that she attends for friends and families of alcoholics. I had no idea this was what she was trying to get me to do a year before. They read the opening and the words spoke to me; “we have become irritable and unreasonable without knowing it.” 

After that first meeting my life changed for the better. I came to understand myself more and found that even my relationship with my higher power became stronger. So much stronger in fact that I began having a hard time with the vague “higher power” of the secular program.

As a Christian, I felt that I am meant to spread the good news to people who do not know Jesus. But, in the secular program, I am not allowed to do that. We are to respect one another and the god of their choosing. I love that program and have seen how others have benefited from it and besides, I thought, “most the people I have met in the program are Christian.”

In my third year of recovery, I felt the calling to start a group in my area alongside my best friend. We had prayed on it for a long time and really didn’t know where to start. I started attending Victory Church in O’Fallon a year and a half before and was going to speak to Pastor Jon Cannon about my future role in the church. I thought that I could ask him if he would be open to us having a meeting at the church once a week. He said no but then he gave his reason why. Unbelievably, it was the same issue that I was having; the vague “higher power.”

Being a firm believer in God, I listened to Pastor Jon’s every word, down to the name Celebrate Recovery. A recovery program that uses the same exact 12 steps that my secular program uses but the one and only higher power in Celebrate Recover is Jesus Christ! Then Pastor said something that I didn’t expect, something along the lines of “leading” and he has a lot of material if it was something I was interested in.

I kept this with me but didn’t think that I was fit to lead something that I really didn’t know much about. For the next few weeks, Celebrate Recovery would come to mind at random moments in the day. Each time I would think that I am not the person that can do this. After much prayer and journaling, I finally came to realize that this is what I am being called to do. The next step was to talk to my sponsor who has supported me in the decision I came to and that was to answer Gods call.

I reached out to Pastor Jon and asked him for the materials, as well as asking for volunteers to help me get this ministry off the ground. I could not have done this without my friends and family who stepped up with me. We are all just regular people wanting to heal from our past with Jesus Christ leading the way. I am no longer feeling unmanageable, depressed, or lost and the anger that I had is quenched with the tools that come straight from the Bible.

So, if you are feeling lost and not sure where to go, come see us at Victory Church, we will help shine the light on how to use those tools that Jesus Himself talked about and you will be on your own road to recovery!

Bridget