“Service” is a broad term. In my opinion, simply attending a meeting is Service. My life in recovery has taken me all over the world, to meetings big and small. Without the other AA members, these meetings couldn’t exist. I am grateful for every attendee at every meeting I’ve ever been to. Even if I disagree with a detail of what someone says, or how they say it, we are all God’s kids trudging the path together. As p87 of the Big Book says (in a narrower context)

“Be quick to see where others are right. Make use of what they have to offer.” Take what you like, and leave the rest.

Beyond this (literally) entry-level Service, there are more active opportunities to support a meeting. Doors must be opened, chairs set out, coffee made, newcomers greeted, literature arranged harmoniously.

In my experience, thriving groups formalise these roles, so that most folks can have something to do. If you don’t have an official post, please help set up the chairs, or clear away at the end. I’ve had some wonderful conversations while doing the washing-up.

Regular attendees give coherence to a group. They allow folk who might otherwise drift away to identify with the group and feel a sense of “Home”. Sticking around at particular meetings meant that I got to know people better and they got to know me. They made it harder for me to dissemble, and allowed me to trust them enough to be honest.

A particularly cool meeting commitment is coffee or tea maker. Meetings I’ve attended in Britain and America generally last 90 minutes, and refreshments are usually made available in mid-meeting. We are thirsty folk. I can still be tongue-tied at times

and am grateful for the opportunity to connect with folk at a meeting through undertaking meeting commitments.

The sponsor’s own Service is to assess his own practice of sobriety, and find a way to express lessons he has learned in a way which is effective for the particular sponsee. I ruefully acknowledge that as a sponsor, I often discover holes in my own fabric of recovery. I have my own sponsor to turn to to sort out my confusions, but I never discuss with my sponsor details of my sponsee’s situation.

There are other admin roles. Over the years, I’ve been secretary, treasurer, GSR representative, and literature guy for different meetings at different times. These commitments require a slightly longer duration of sobriety, but I try to avoid creating any sense of “recovery hierarchy”. We are all capable of being idiots. We are all sober just for today.

Beyond the sponsor-sponsee relation, another level of Service is fellowship. This can mean the wonderful “meeting after the meeting”, where members gather together for coffee or a meal, and talk in a more relaxed way about what’s going on in their lives. Through these, I learned about social interactions without alcohol. Giving newcomers lifts to and from meetings is another wonderful opportunity to give and to learn. Whatsapp & Zoom mean I can have weekly conversations around the world with recovering alcoholics who are now friends.

My favourite such commitment is an obscure one: “speaker-finder”. Speaker meetings are one of the most popular in our AA roster. A new speaker must be asked beforehand each week. In my humble view, it’s best if speakers come from outside the speaker meeting itself. This ensures an input of new ideas, and sometimes the speaker decides to become a regular. So a diligent speaker-finder must attend many other different meetings and listen to many shares. What a gig! What can a newcomer do to be of Service, right from the start?

There are many other kinds of Service: webmasters, outreach, general service at national or international levels, etc, etc, but perhaps the greatest responsibility in Service is Step 12: contact with newcomers and struggling members. As an introduction, I had no idea how challenging and interesting telephone hotline support would be. Beyond that, there is the need to go to hospitals, prisons or homes. I would not be here today

Get a sponsor! It may not be obvious that a sponsee is doing a Service, but really they are. Countless times, I’ve heard a speaker express gratitude for being a sponsor and for what they’ve had a chance to learn through the experience.

if a man called Francis, God bless his memory, had not carried the message to me without ego, one day long ago. The need to be present, to listen, and to carry a message to another human being at possibly the critical point of their lives underscores my responsibility to work on my own recovery:

“The answers will come, if your own house is in order. But obviously you cannot transmit something you haven’t got. See to it that your relationship with them is right, and great events will come to pass for you and countless others.”