October 1999

Over 23 years ago, Dr. Mark Vander Meer had a vision to reach spiritually lost, emotionally hurt and relationally disenfranchised. He knew that people in Grand Rapids needed Christ, His people and a supportive community that will consistently be present weekly year round. On October 1, 1999, a vision was born.

Community Recovery’s vision:

To bridge recovering people to Jesus, recovery, and into the community as Christ- centered difference makers.

The First Night…

The first night of Community Recovery saw 25 people show up. We started with a dinner at 6:00, recovery worship at 7:00, and 7-10 support groups from 7:45 to 8:45 every Friday night; we continue with this same schedule today.

Dinner

Dinner is served at no charge at 6:00 PM every Friday night. This is an opportunity to connect over a great meal and to prepare the hearts for recovery worship.

Worship

After dinner, everyone met in a classroom sitting in rows and sang worship songs led by Mark Brakla, a grateful recovered child of God with hair down to his waist and a boom box to belt out the songs. This in addition to guests sharing stories and hearing a talk from Dr. Mark or another speaker set the pattern for the past 23 years.

Groups

The first support groups included Grief, AA, Codependency, Depression support, and many other like groups.

Two Nights

In 2016, Dr. Mark welcomed Pastor Greg Chandler to the Community Recovery team. Together in Christ, Dr. Mark and Pastor Greg were able to launch a second Community Recovery night on Mondays. From September 2016 through March of 2020, Community Recovery grew from one night to two nights of high impact recovery ministry serving 300-400 people weekly. Then came COVID-19…

COVID 2019-2020 & Online

In March of 2020, everything changed. Michigan’s governor declared lockdowns due to COVID-19, and since Community Recovery’s church partners chose to shut down their respective campuses seven days a week for the moment, all in person ministry ceased. Dr. Mark and Pastor Greg went ONLINE to reach as many of our guests as we could. God made it larger! Community Recovery was now reaching people worldwide.

Today

Today, as you read Community Recovery’s first blog, you are seeing the results that Dr. Mark and Pastor Greg have worked on for the past three years. Community Recovery is online daily at crirecovery.online.church to provide recovery worship, devotionals, 12 step sessions, and Dr. Mark’s podcast “Check UP! with Dr. Mark.”

In 2023 Community Recovery will expand to bring a full package of online courses that will equip and educate people in recovery in institutions and in communities worldwide.

What will be our first courses? We will have one on the 12 Steps and the Bible called 12 Steps 2 Life and another called Conquering Conflict God’s Way.

These courses begin our education arm, LifeWork Learning. This education arm of Community Recovery will also serve as our first online business to support our ministry to those in need of Christ centered recovery support in urban areas in the United States and in other third world countries.

Stay tuned as these courses roll out on our website.

We covet your prayers and need your support today to bring recovery ministry week after week in Grand Rapids and worldwide online.