Bill Wanted to Puke When Ebby Said I’ve Got Religion – Dick B.

We'll get rolling. I was discussing my favorite topic, me, in the last hour and we ran over. So we're going to do a little bit of readjusting time-wise and this blessed next segment would be a bit shorter. We're goingto talk about the specific Oxford Group impact on our steps and I think that you will find that we can identify a lot of expressions that came from Oxford Group thinking and writing in our steps. So we'll talk about step one, powerless over alcohol and the unmanageable life. Now it might be stretching things to say that the expression powerless came from the Oxford Group. I will say that Ann Smith talked about that concept and Shoemaker wrote this. He said, it, sin, makes a gap between myself and the ideal which I am powerless to bridge. Only God, therefore, can deal with sin. He must contrive to do for us what we have lost the power to do for ourselves. Did that spill over into the first step? I don't know. What's more important is something that I mentioned before, the unmanageability prayer. And this is neat because Frank Buchmann took this prayer all over the world. In fact, it first arose in India, or in the Himalayas, actually. There was a little schoolboy named Victor, and he sought out Frank Buchman for help. And what Buchman said was this, What we need is faith. When we are particularly willing to forsake sin and follow Christ, then joy and release come. What we want to do is get in touch with him and turn our lives over to him. Where should we go to do it? at once the lad replied there's only one place on our knees the lad prayed one of those powerful simple prayers which are so quickly heard by him who made the eye and the ear oh lord manage me for i cannot manage myself now you'll find that prayer in a number of different oxford group books and accounts, and it's called Victor's Story. Well, somebody in Sam Shoemaker's church thought of it was original with that church, and Irving Harris wrote of this story. One morning as the two, Sam and a poorly educated Eastsider named Charlie, chatted in the rectory hallway, it happened. No one knows what the rector said on that occasion, but a new life came to Charlie, and those who heard about Charlie's prayer could never forget it. It was a classic, a simple plea in eight words, God manage me because I can't manage myself. And Dr. Bob's wife recited a similar prayer in her workbook. So I don't need to belabor that we were alcoholic and couldn't manage our own lives, and probably no human power could relieve us of our alcoholism and so forth. But the unmanageability concept seems unmistakably linked to Oxford group language because it was so common, and Anne was using it. What about step two in a power greater than ourselves? Well, I won't talk a lot about a power, but many, many Oxford group people talked about a Power with a capital P, and they were certainly talking about God. It was not a rocking chair or a bulldozer or a light bulb. It was God. But they did talk about power, the need for power. And one of the things, and we'll get to this a little bit later, Shoemaker used many expressions, a force greater than ourselves, a power greater than ourselves. Stephen Foote talked about a power that can change human nature. And so the idea that came to believe in a power i've already discussed with you the oxford group ideas that there was there needed to be belief willingness and seeking and the expression you probably know that the original second step in aa read god came to leave that god could restore us to sanity and it was changed to a power greater than ourselves and i think bill must have smiled when he made some of these revisions because he knew what he was talking about he was telling about God. And yet he put in an expression like that with a capital P, and then on page 45 it said we must find a power greater than ourselves which can solve our problem. And then the next page says that power is God. So we know what we're talking about. We also know that the expression was not something Bill dreamed up. It was something the Oxford group was commonly using, and we'll illustrate that at a later point with specific language. The third step, it is remarkable how close Oxford Group language is to the language of our big book steps. I already read you the concept of a decision. The Oxford Group specifically talked in many, many, many different pieces of literature, as did Ann Smith, about a decision The Oxford Group initial act of surrender is not in any way an outward and visible ceremony. We feel we must shrink from it as a simple decision put in simple language spoken aloud to God. Nothing more need to be added. So the third step idea of a decision and the actual language decision is Oxford Group language. God as you understand him. Very, very common in Oxford Group writing today and yesterday to talk of a surrender of as much of yourself as you know or as much as you understand to as much God as you now or as you understand. And just to make the point and I'll make it even more in some other spots life began for me with a surrender of all that I know of self to all that I knew of God. That's Stephen Foote in Life Began Yesterday. Are you prepared to do his will, let the cost be what it may. That is a surrender of all one knows of self to all one knows of God. And when we get to Shoemaker, we'll see he talked about surrendering to God as we understood him. And that's what Bill was talking about before he ever met Jim B. How do we know this? Well, I found the manuscripts at Stepping Stones, which predated the big book. And he writes on page 30 of one of the manuscripts called Bill's Original Story. This is what my friend, Ebi Thatcher, suggested I do. Turn my face to God as I understand him and say to him with earnestness, complete honesty and abandon that I henceforth place my life at his disposal and direction forever. So he was talking about God as i understand him. And then read page 13 of the big book. There I humbly offered myself to God as I then understood him. So this idea that you don't need to understand God to make a surrender to him was an Oxford Group concept well in place. Now how about turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him? Well, there's lots of Oxford Group language like that. Sam Shoemaker wrote of a parishioner, she surrendered to God her groundless fears and turned over to him her life for his direction. That used to be the language of the third step. And then quoting a minister whom Shoemaker described as the militant mystic, he said, That night, I decided to launch out into the deep, and with the decision to cast my will and my life on God, there came an indescribable sense of relief, of burdens dropping away. So you see where the ideas had influenced A.A., the third step decision, but there was actual language. You'd almost think that Bill was plagiarizing, and yet there's not much evidence that he did much reading of any Oxford Group material. He just heard it, and heard it. and heard it. And those were the kinds of things that he heard. Fourth step, looking for your own part. There are many comments in Oxford literature about we must examine ourselves, we must find our own part and the big book is just filled with language like that four-step language putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done. We We resolutely looked for our own mistakes. Where had we been selfish, dishonest, self-seeking, and frightened? Though a situation had not been entirely our fault, we tried to disregard the other person. Where were we to blame? And so forth. Language very similar to that can be found in countless Oxford group pieces. We made a fearless and searching for moral inventory, says the big book. Making the moral test was from the book Soul Surgery that I held up for you. And in order to examine, you had to make a moral test. And the moral test was to examine your life in terms of the four absolutes. One writer has said it was the Oxford Group game of truth. I found no evidence of that, but I found plenty of evidence that Oxford Group people made a moral text by taking a look at their life in termsof the four absolutes. And a written inventory. Remember I said there were two different Oxford Group books that talked about doing a business inventory and taking stock. Those are Oxford Group expressions, and they found their way into the big book almost verbatim. Confession. The Oxford Group not only talked about James 5.16, confess your faults one to another, as the basis for the confession idea, and AA literature talks about that, although the big books don't talk about it. The big book doesn't mention that, But the idea of honesty with God and with yourself and with another human being is Oxford Group language. It's in the Shoemakers' The Church Can Save the World and in Ann Smith's journal. So not only was the idea a confession, but also the exact language of admitting to God, ourselves, and another human Being the exact nature of our wrongs. Conviction. that's a hard one to identify in AA except we know they talked of the five C's and conviction was one of them and we know that conviction was about changing your conduct you did the examination, you did The Confession and then you decided am I going to hate and forsake this conduct am Igoing to repent, am Igoing to change and so while you can't identify the idea of conviction in the big book You can certainly identify it in Ann Smith's language and in Lois Wilson's Oxford Group Notebook. And take a look at the appendices in my books where I quote Lois Williamson's book. She talks about convicted of being too possessive of Bill, things of that nature. Surrender of sins and removal of them. I told you I spent a lot of time trying to find this concept of removal in the Bible, but I sure found it in the Oxford Group. Ann Smith talked about removal of sins, and Stephen Foote, I think, or it was Victor Kitchen was talking about removal. God can remove these sins. And so again, the concept of God's removing is something that was Oxford Group language. How about restitution? And underlying this, remember, was a repeated Oxford Group reference to willingness. Willingness comes up in our second step. Willingness comes up in our sixth step. Willingless comes up in our eighth step. And then the spiritual appendix, honesty, open-mindedness, and willingness are the indispensable elements, blah, blah, bla. And so the concept of willingness was Oxford Group, and it came, you can find it in Philip Marshall Brown's book, The Venture of Belief. Sam Shoemaker used to pass that book around. And he wrote an inscription in it to Philip Marshall Brown. They were buddies, and it talked about a religious experience, willingness, a decision. It's Oxford Group language. We've already gone into the big thing that the Oxford Group made about restitution. It was the heart of the Oxford group beginning. Bookman had to make an apology to his six ministers to get his mind clear of hatred. This is elementary AA stuff. How about step 10 and daily surrender well um the oxford group talked about a lot about you have to continue on with your surrender and i'm going to read some things from what is the oxfor group the eight points of the oxfer group and shoemaker our lives will be one continuous surrender surrender to god of every difficulty that confronts us each temptation and eat spiritual trouble, laying before him either to take away or to show us in their proper spiritual proportions. Another one, when I came to make a daily surrender, I learned what a difference experience this is from a general surrender. Daily checking on the four absolutes, you see what they were checking with, their tests were the four absolutes, revealed to me things I'd never questioned myself. I came into a daily willingness to do anything for God. I made amends where he gave me light. And then another one. There is a need, this is Shoemaker, there is a needs for rededication day by day, hour by hour, by which progressively in every quiet time the contaminations of sin and self-will are further left off, and then he says, for they do have a way of collecting, and we are kept in fresh touch with the living Spirit of God. A further surrender is needed when and whenever there is found to be something in us which offends Christ or walls us off from another. We shall need in this sense to keep surrendering as long as we live. Straight 10th step stuff. And then the 11th step, sought through prayer and meditation. Just endless things in the Oxford group. I will get into specific language shortly about the importance of asking God's forgiveness if you screwed up in the morning, laying out your plans for the day and seeking his guidance, continuing to study the word and devotionals. It's all in the big book there. And then the one agitated and in doubt thing, many verses about the importance of continuing to seek God's help in times of stress. And lastly, the spiritual awakening. As I said, there are a number of expressions in the Oxford group for a spiritual awakening and experience of god religious experience and so on and then the things about it in the big book there was a sense of victory the great fact is just this and nothing less um it is true that our first print ever gave many readers the impression that these personality changes must be sudden and spectacular and the oxford group often wrote it doesn't have to be sudden and spectacularand then it's really fun you have to give it away to keep it i was astonished as i as i read all this literature to see that our expressions are straight oxford group expressions and one of the things that comes from both of these are shoemaker expressions but they're found in ann smith's journal giving christianity away is the best way to keep it we can't give away what we haven't got ever heard that concept you know you can't do any better than what your own experience has enabled you to learn and you can'T share something if you haven't got it. I used to hear this guy at the Alano Club at a Saturday morning meeting, and he'd say, you can only share what you have. If you've done the first step, you can share the first step. And Moody was writing way, way back in the 1800s, never share an inch beyond your own experience. We can't give away what we haven't got. And then Shoemaker writing, the best way to keep what youhave is to give it away, and no substitute has ever been found for Christian witness. So that's the witnessing part of the 12th step, and then living the principles. And often the Oxford group were talking about 1 Corinthians 13 and the Sermon on the Mount. They would frequently refer to the fact that a person should line his life up with the principles of the Serman on the Mountain. And it was said, I believe, of Henry Drummond that his entire life was spent trying to live 1 Corinthians 13. So the principles, what are they? Well, the Oxford group defined them as the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, 1 Corinthians 14. And as I said, those words spilled over into the big book. Now, I'm keeping my eye on the clock because it's going to be a shorter session and Willis is going to ding me with a huge alarm clock here. But some quickies on some basic Oxford Group ideas. God is. It's so neat. The big book says, when we became alcoholics crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else he is nothing. God either is or he isn't. What was our choice to be? Here's Shoemaker. Faith is not sight, it is a high gamble. There are only two alternatives here. God is or he isn't. You leap one way or the other, it's a risk to take the bet, it is a risk to bet everything you have on God. And then there is one who has all power, that one is God, may you find him now, and Shoemaker wrote when you want, what you want is simply a vital religious experience, you need to find God. Then the idea of God as we understood him. We'll come back to that. Establishing a relationship to God. I wrote a long time ago that AA was about establishing a relationship with God and the distinguished historian said, I deny it. Show it to me in the big book. Well, get the concordance out and you'll be surprised at how many times it says that. But the Oxford group talked about the importance of establishing a relationship with god and so did Ann Smith. and then the barriers or blocks to god you know our big book talks about we were spiritually sick and we had to remove the things that were blocking us says liquor and bottles were said merely to be symptoms or symbols of the underlying problem which was selfishness and center self-centeredness those were oxford group ideas the turning point we've already described how william james talked about the turning point, the crisis of surrender as being the turning point. Plenty of discussion of prayer. Plenty of discussion of morning meditations and devotions. Plenty of discussion about seeking help from the religious. Plenty of discussions about putting things in God's hands, an expression that appears often in the big book one way or another. Faith without works is dead, not only in the Bible but in the little book What is the Oxford Group? Fellowship and fellowship of the Spirit. One writer made fun of the expression on the last page of the big book, and he says we could say amen. Well, the Oxford group did say amen, and they were talking about the fellowship of this spirit. You'll find it in First John and a lot of other places. Shoemaker was constantly talking about the koinonia, the idea of a fellowship in which the common bond that people have with the gift of holy spirit is the essence of the fellowship so it was a fellowship of the spirit and there's biblical authority and then sharing experience strength and hope straight oxford group stuff you know these ideas came to us and bill picked up on them now i'm going to take the rest of the time to just show you how many Oxford Group expressions, and I counted without really doing a totally exhaustive thing, 187 expressions in the big book. Hey, that sucker is only 164 pages long, and a lot of it talks about alcohol, so I haven't bothered to eliminate the alcoholism pages, but just think that out of 164 pages you can readily identify 187 words and phrases that are Oxford Group expressions. And could there be more? Probably. And could you take taking out the chapter more about alcoholism and some of Bill's story and the chapter to the wives and to the employers and a few other things, just think what the writers have passed it on observed accurately was that the big book was heavy with oxford group principles and that bill borrowed freely from them what we don't know is how he borrowed them did he sit down with victor kitchens i was a pagan in front of him i doubt it there's no evidence of whether he did or he didn't but i do believe that he heard this stuff day in and day out. Lois said they constantly went to Oxford Group meetings, constantly and Bill was hanging out with Hanford Twitchell and going to Towns Hospital and the Calvary Rescue Mission and meetings at Calvory House and talking to drunks and talking Oxford Group and hanging out with Oxford Group people Victor Kitchen, Roller, Roland Hazard Shep Cornell it's in Shoemaker's journals It's in Lois Remembers. Bill was constantly in the company of these people, and what were they talking about? The kind of stuff that wound up in the big book. The kind OF stuff that we AAs talk about in our special kind of jargon. Keep it simple, stupid, all that great stuff. Here are a few of them. I've got religion. Remember that one in the Big Book? Ebby says, I've Got Religion. Bill wanted to puke. Next one. Shoemaker was writing, a vast power outside themselves. Another time he wrote, a force outside himself greater than himself. Another time, he wrote a power within yet coming from outside myself, a power far stronger than I was. Take your choice. Bill had a lot of choices and he selected a power greater than ourselves, a personal God. Remember when Bill said, I didn't have any faith in a God personal to me? Well, he had heard that kind of an expression and he was having some problems with it before he got sober. New power and direction came to her when she started listening to God. In each case I put a parallel big book expression. Some are very accurate and close and some are a little more distant. but love of god you know a loving god as he may express himself in our group conscience marvel at what god has done for you that expression appeared over and over a spiritual experience in god's hands and perish the thought higher power you know the big book uses that expression exactly twice both times in the context of god and the oxford group used it once in their history, once. And it was in the context of God and it was Victor Kitchen's book. And then this power by which human nature can be changed and then I made the surrender of my will to the divine purpose. And then another one. He made a decision to surrender to God and then i had in other words actually become God conscious. It's in the big book. These are Oxford group phrases not big book phrases. refusal to believe is as much a decision as the willingness to believe ever heard of willingness to believe a man had to simply step out of his own light to become immediately and keenly conscious of the presence of God that expressions in the big book many times God's sufficiency remember the little story about the Wright brothers when some of us talked about self-sufficiency and God's efficiency i felt like those who said the right brothers would never fly he is the all-parading reality here's one consciousness of the presence and the companionship of god a creator that's not only in the bible it's an oxford group expression you'll find it 12 times in the big book maker director father infinite power spirit oxford group expressions bible expressions most of them and certainly big book expressions god floods in when a man is honest we must surrender our wills to a greater will and that will sets us free we must be absolutely honest with ourselves let go abandon yourself to him say to him not my will but thine be done you need to find god abandon yourself to him he made his decision the decision to cast my will and my life on god we are bidden by frank bookman to make the moral test the first step for me was to be honest with god the next to be honest with men if a person is honest with himself and with God he will be honest with us also how can anyone who professes to love God and his neighbor as himself as all Christians must do allow a wrong he has done to go unrighted I discovered four things which needed to be putting right in my life there was a restitution which I would not make every person I have wronged I have seen and made restitution to him insofar as I was able. You know, made direct amends to such people wherever possible, blah, blah. In order to leave nothing undone in an attempt to make things right with people, I wrote 14 letters of confession of specific wrong. Spiritual awakening. Selfish and self-centered. You even find that in the Oxford Group newspapers. Self-will seems the blackest sin of all that is what the oxford group is working for changed lives god-centered in place of self-centered for most men the world is centered in self which is misery self almost think you're hearing charlie parmley talking self was at the bottom of many of these decisions there is a good deal of sorrow in our life of our own making remember the big book our problems we think are of our own making. God showed me, however, that it was not only possible to be honest in advertising but to be unselfish, loving, and pure. Where God guides, he provides. I just threw that one in for good measure. We were reborn into life. Remember the little discussion at the end of the third step? We were reborned. She saw how definite sin was blocking her from christ and then these expressions four-step ideas if then i want god to take control of my life the first thing i must do is produce the books a good way to begin this examination of the books is to test my life beside the sermon on the mount if when a trader finds his way into the bankruptcy court it is revealed that for years he has not taken stock. He's very severely censured. Now, I don't know how familiar you are with the big book, but this is just almost identical big book language. The thing which is striking about much of the misery one sees is that it is spiritual misery. The root of the malady is estrangement from God. What is our real problem? Isn't it fear, dishonesty, resentment, and selfishness any reason remnant of resentment hatred or grudge blocks god out effectively thy will be done i see struggling to pull myself up and stepped out of the way so that his light could shine down to me remember we were blocking ourselves from the sunlight of the spirit moral recovery starts when one everyone admits his own faults instead of spotlighting the other fellows. Hundreds have fallen ill. Some have committed suicide because they had no faith to substitute for fear, and fear literally ate the heart out of them, and its antidote is faith in God. It takes the power of God to remove these fears and mental conditions. Putting our sins and spiritual problems into words to another makes us absolutely honest with God. Fifth step stuff. i have found that to deal drastically with sins it's necessary to share them completely with someone in whom we have confidence remember we found the close mouth understanding friend here's almost identical big book language they are prepared to pocket their pride risk their reputation hazard their material interest for the sake of living in the open with their fellows i believe there is no other sure way to a full surrender to god god cannot take over my life unless i am willing it takes the power of god to remove the desire for these indulgences god's removal again um voluntary confession and restitution bring home the seriousness of wrongdoing more effectively than any other curative method. There will be a great many things I can never put right now. Remember the big book talks about there's some things we can never fully write. I went to a theological student who seemed to me to be troubled, to be suffering, and confessed to him my own secret sin, impurity. The student came to life, confessed his secret sin to me, and ended our talk by saying prayer is going to mean something now. the fourth signpost is an intuitive conviction that a course of action is inherently right the certainty that hard as it may be there can be no other way remember the 11th step talk about intuitive thoughts that is what the Oxford group is working for changed lives God centered in place of self centered and the change continuing every day under the guidance of his Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, not my will but thy will be done. It's not only biblical, but it's in the big book. I emerged into God consciousness. Where I used to plan the day, I now simply ask God's guidance on the day. It means letting go of your own plans and desires for your own life and trusting that God could run it better than yourself. Spiritual growth, however, was to enter into new forms of usefulness for man and God. Remember the little expression at the discussion of the point of the steps was our main purpose is to be of maximum service to God and our fellow man? Bookman forbade his people to speak or write one inch beyond their experience. And then there was this fun story that I got on the telephone with Ellie Newton at age 94 not long ago. And I said, you know, was there an Oxford Group idea of news, not views? And she said, of course, Dick. You know, Frank told me he'd arranged this luncheon with the Queen of Greece and she said what would I say to a queen? And he said, well, you'd curtsy and then you would tell her what God had done for you or how God had changed your life. the best way to keep an experience of christ is to pass it on recognize the man in need who is longing to find god they have got something that's an evasive phrase for saying they believe in and trust god it works never heard that expression shortest sentence in the big book bill wilson has the book in his library as one of the only three oxford books that he owns it works. It's from a fool hath said only the expression is a fool has said there is no God if they listen to us instead of to God they will depend on us instead of him. How many times does the big book talk about placing dependence upon others instead of dependence on God misery of our own making first things first many did not hesitate to call this force the power of God An experience that is not shared dies or becomes twisted and abnormal. The person with an experience of God in a poor technique will make fewer mistakes in the end than the person with a high technique and no God. Let go, abandon yourself to him. Fellowship is the essence of the group, spirit of the universe. Ever heard that one? We are told that conversion is gradual or sudden. And you could look at the spiritual appendix. Nine-tenths of our misery is due to self-centeredness. To get ourselves off our hands is the essence of happiness. Then this one, the forbidden subject. They recognize that the sex instinct is at bottom a God-given one. Remember how much talk there is about God alone as the judge of our sex situation and so on. It is the way of young-mindedness to treat one's spiritual defects as a problem, not a fate. And we must honestly ask ourselves where lies our final security—whether it lies in people and things or whether it lies with God. God and mercy strip us this day of the last vestiges of self-reliance and help us to begin anew trusting to nothing but his grace you know in the big book it talks about when it's talking about fear it says wasn't it because self-reliance failed us you know that's not those are not the only oxford group expressions but when i revised the oxford loop every book used to be yellow and i think people got tired of looking at yellow books so now we make them blue and other colors but one of the things i did was to take a lot of time to go through and see how many Oxford Goop expressions I could find. Now, you know, Bill Wilson was not the only guy that read Oxford Goot material. Dr. Bob, if I can find it, said in his last major address, talking about himself and Bill Wilson, we had both been associated with the Oxford Gook, Bill in New York for five months and I in Akron for two and a half years. Bill had acquired their idea of service. I had not, but I had done an immense amount of reading they had recommended. So you see, these people didn't mince words about the fact that they had done a tremendous amount of reading of Oxford Group literature and then a word about where they found it. Each one of these little vignettes has come from very strange sources. I couldn't figure out how the people in Akron got Oxford Group books and I asked Jimmy Newton he says well Dick they used to swap them and finally I tracked down T. Henry Williams' daughter who's a great lady and she lives in California not very far from where I lived and I said what do you know about your your dad and Bill Wilson and Bob and she said I was just a young person in those days Dick but she said I cooked dinner once for Bill and Lois at one of the meetings there and I had a good time I said well what doyou know about Oxford books were there any around and she says, oh yes. She said in the furnace room in the basement there were tables with Oxford Group books on them. And so little by little you have a hunch and you say where did we get all these expressions? How did the Oxford Group have its impact? And where did it have its effect? I don't know where it had it but I know what the founders said. We got our ideas from the Oxford Group and as Bill went through the years more and more he broadened and broadened his expressions about where the Oxford Group ideas came from. Finally staying, you know, everything came from the Oxford group and the question is, well, how did that happen? And the answer is there was literature. They had a book room in Calvary House in New York and Julia Harris before she died was on the phone with me and she says, Dick, I was in charge of the book room down there. We mailed out Oxford Group literature all over the United States There were volunteers down there sending out literature. They had recommended lists. And here's what Bill said, just to close the Oxford group. Way back in 1941, he was scared to death. He said, I'd give anything, he told Jack Alexander, I'd gives anything if you could avoid mentioning the matter at all. But if it must be noted, I'm quite anxious to avoid words carrying criticism or sting. After all, we owe our lives to the group. By 1943, he said, while I shall be eternally grateful to the Oxford Group for my own recovery, I cannot see the advantage of raising unnecessary prejudice. By 1955, here's what he was saying, the basic principles which the Oxford groupers had taught were ancient and universal ones, the common property of mankind. Certain of the former OG attitudes and applications had proved unsuited to AA's purpose, and Sam, that's Shoemaker, own conviction about these lesser aspects of the Oxford group had changed and become more like our AA views of today. But the important thing is this. The early AA got its ideas of self-examination, acknowledgement of character defects, restitution for harm done in working with others straight from the Oxford groups and directly from Sam Shoemaker their former leader in America and from nowhere else. Then in the foreword to the second edition of the big book, he added this to the picture. Though he, Bill Wilson, could not accept all the tenets of the Oxford group, he was convinced of the need for moral inventory, confession of personality defects, restitution to those harmed, helpfulness to others, and the necessity of belief in and dependence upon God. And finally in 1960, he finally said, where did we get all these ideas and then he goes on with prayer and meditation and he said and all the rest of it well we got it from the oxford group he said so you know the truth came slowly bill was trying to protect the fellowship from those four little hookers about the ox for group that i'd mentioned and uh finally after frank bookman died he said i'm sorry that i didn't seek that man out and tell him how much we owed to him. So this is not a eulogy for Frank Buchman, but it is a statement that Bill came hard by his willingness to disclose even general ideas that came from the Oxford Group. And you'll be happy to know that at long last we're coming to a close of the Oxford group, which, you know, there are some ideas in A8. One distinguished former trusted servant said what do we want to talk about the oxford group we got out of bed with those fellows we don't want to get back into bed with them well i'm not saying go get back in the bed with them but i am saying it's pretty hard if you want to know where a ideas came from and understand the meaning of them it's it's impossible to ignore the ox for group because that's where the structure came so now even without willis's alarm clock we're going to take a 15 minute break But at the end of 10 minutes, we're going to have a distinguished lady lead us in some boogie-boo stuff. Some little music as a breaker-upper. We're going do some rockin' and rollin' here. So be back in 10 minutes and we'll do a little relaxer.