Early in recovery, I always looked to those with a little bit more sobriety than myself; I think guys with two days -to-one year sobriety are in an excellent position to encourage the newcomer, rather than someone with 20 years sobriety (I was always (wrongly) suspect of these long time sober people; like they were there to laugh at me or something).
I read a story where an incident at an A.A. meeting happened like this:
Drunk No 1: "Hi I'm 17 days sober and my life is falling apart!"
Drunk No 2: "Hi I'm 18 days sober and life's getting better. Keep commin' back!"
I really really liked that.