How The Refuge Began (Episode 3)
How The Refuge Began (Episode 3)

Relational Recovery

Wes, Austin and Tom talk about how The Refuge began and what faith-based recovery means, centring on grace, relationships and receiving God’s love. They reflect on holding the tension between religious expectations and practical care for people in addiction recovery.

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8:11•13 May 2026

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Faith, Grace and The Birth of The Refuge

Episode Overview

Faith-based recovery at The Refuge is described as gospel-centred, focused on loving God and loving others in relational ways.
Tom emphasises that real change begins when people receive God’s love rather than trying to earn it through effort and rule‑keeping.
The Refuge often faces criticism from both irreligious people and church communities, sitting in a challenging middle ground.
Tom shares his shift from rigid, behaviour-focused approaches to a grace-filled stance that trusts God to do the changing.
Rather than judging or fixing others, the focus is on modelling Christlike character and prioritising relationships in recovery.

“If guys can come through here as I’ve been trying to get through here to receive God’s love, man, I think that’s it. That’s green light.”

What makes a recovery story truly inspiring? This conversation from Relational Recovery takes you right into the heart of how The Refuge began and what keeps it going, decades later. Wes Thompson and co-host Austin Hill sit down with Tom to unpack what “faith-based” means in a recovery setting that takes both Christian spirituality and real human struggle seriously.

Tom boils it down in a simple way: “There is a God, I’m not him,” and from there, everything flows out of loving God and loving others in a deeply relational way. You’ll hear how The Refuge aims to be a safe place where people can work out their own journeys towards knowing God, receiving his love, and, perhaps hardest of all, learning to love themselves in the middle of addiction and shame.

Tom explains that if men “can come through here… to receive God’s love… that’s green light. That’s where everything can then be into transformation.” The episode also digs into the tension of being “too Christian” for some and “not Christian enough” for others.

Tom shares how he moved from rigid, behaviour-focused religion to a grace-centred posture, learning to step away from self-reliance and legalism and into something more like Jesus’ middle way—holding love for both the so‑called “heathen” and the “pharisee”. Instead of trying to fix everyone, Tom talks about focusing on modelling Christlike character, checking his own heart, and remembering that change belongs to God.

For anyone interested in recovery that cares about both spiritual depth and practical healing, this conversation gives a candid look at the DNA of The Refuge and its long-term mission. If you’ve ever felt caught between religious expectations and real-life brokenness, this story might help you ask: what would grace look like in my own recovery today?

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