(Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, James, 1 Corinthians 13)

A.A.’s Bible roots are as numerous and varied as the A.A. sources that used them. If you start with the Bible devotionals in wide use by A.A.’s old-timers, you’ll see lots of mention of all the Bible verses, chapters, and books we’ll discuss in the various parts of this presentation. Key among the devotionals were The Upper Room, The Runner ‘s Bible, Daily Strength for Daily Needs, and My Utmost For His Highest. These books and pamphlets covered many verses and segments of the Bible other than the Sermon on the Mount, the Book of James, and 1 Corinthians 13. Many of these other verses and segments were studied by, and important to, A.A.’s pioneers. You can find them mentioned almost anywhere you start.

If you start with the books Dr. Bob’s wife Anne recommended and shared from her journal with early AAs and their families, you will find Anne recommending the Book of Acts, Psalms, Proverbs, the Gospels, and other specific sections. She also recommended Fosdick’s book on The Meaning of Prayer, which is filled with Bible references pertaining to prayer. She recommended several books on the life of Jesus Christ which also are filled with Bible references. She recommended life-changing books by Sam Shoemaker and others. These titles spell out appropriate Bible sources for the very spiritual ideas Rev. Shoemaker was teaching early AAs. So too with the Glenn Clark books and E. Stanley Jones books.

If you start with some of the books Dr. Bob recommended, you’ll be looking at The Greatest Thing in the World by Drummond, which discusses 1 Corinthians 13. You’ll look at several commentaries about Matthew chapters 5-7 (the sermon on the mount delivered by Jesus). These include books by Oswald Chambers, Glenn Clark, E. Stanley Jones, Emmet Fox, Robert E. Speer, Emmet Fox, and others. Most of those authors discuss almost every single verse in the sermon. Though there is no commentary on the Book of James, The Runner’s Bible (which Dr. Bob widely recommended) discusses many parts of James--the book Anne frequently read to Bob and Bill at the Smith home in the summer of 1935. The many books by Rev. Sam Shoemaker, Oxford Group writers, new thought writers, and others such as Toyohiko Kagawa and Glenn Clark all became rich sources for the simple ideas AAs extracted from the Good Book and incorporated into their spiritual program of recovery. That program, of course, involved intensive work with newcomers, prayer, Bible study, and daily fellowship with like-minded believers.

The focus here will be on the three portions of the Bible which Dr. Bob said he and the early A.A. pioneers considered "absolutely essential." Pointing directly to the roles of the three segments are the following pioneer comments about Matthew chapters 5-7, the Book of James, and 1 Corinthians 13:

The key Bible segments, then–considered absolutely essential in putting together A.A.’s spiritual program of recovery–were the Sermon, James, and 1 Corinthians 13.

And there seems little doubt that any purportedly accurate, comprehensive, and fair study of A.A. history, A.A. principles, A.A. literature, and the A.A. fellowship requires a knowledge of what the early AAs took from the three key Bible sources. Those three segments of Biblical materials clearly influenced or found their way into the Big Book and the Twelve Steps. And those Bible segments are of such historical significance that they justify the following, separate, item-by-item review.

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