Hello sweet friends. It has been awhile since I have blogged and I am so sorry. The last month of confinement and craziness has taken its toll on my stress levels. I have over caffeinated, over slept, and over worked my brain about things happening now and all of the things to come.
In a back and forth battle of enjoying my downtime and desperately needing fresh air and good conversation over pancakes and sunshine…..I find myself in my head a lot.(who am I kidding….I am always over analyzing life) I’ve been thinking a lot about walls. House walls. Emotional walls. Big walls that take bulldozers to knock down and small walls that these West Texas winds could blow over and send away. Why we build walls and why it is a bitter sweet battle to either keep them up or let them fall. WALLS PEOPLE.
Confined in the cozy walls of this home, where I feel safe, free of all life’s chaos, I have been learning a lot about myself. In truth I have been hiding out. Learning about how I don’t particularly like to be alone. I don’t like the idea of quietness or boredom. On the flip side I have caught up on a lot of sleep and a lot of chores that I might otherwise have not ever gotten to. Emotionally speaking I have been tearing down a lot of walls that have been built up over my short 22 years of life. I am learning to love who I am even deeper. I am learning to allow God to take over areas of my heart that bare the weight of anxiety and fear of the unknown.
It is scary discovering your true self. It definitely isn’t always pretty and causes a lot of questioning. CHANGE. Wow, change is a word that I always thought was really causal. Relatable to adjusting, compromising, flexible. Change to me was never really something that seemed hard or scary. Until now.
See it never scared me because I was never really changing. I was just doing the bare minimum to make things work in my day to day life. A close friend of mine opened my eyes to a very pressing topic recently. He asked me, “Are you living a life that God would be proud of? Or do you only need Him when things aren’t going your way?” It got me to thinking about how I have never changed the pieces of myself that I needed to. I was caught in the whirlwind of trials and tribulation so I temporarily altered my life accordingly. I would pray more, harder. Listen to more worship music. Hangout with my more religious friends. Really anything to make myself believe that I was changing. Only until life got straightened out again. Then slowly but surely I would fall back into old habits. See that is the thing about change, It is mostly permanent.
Now, how did we go from walls to change? Well in order to change you must know what needs changing. In order to know what needs changing you must march up to the walls that you have built up and demand them to fall.
The Bible Story of the Battle of Jericho is found in Joshua 6. This was the first conquest of the Israelites as they set out to win the land of Canaan. Scouts from the Israelites crept into the WALLED city of Jericho and hid at the house of Rahab. God told Joshua to utilize an unusual strategy for the battle of Jericho. He told Joshua to have his army march around the city once a day for six straight days. While marching, the soldiers played their trumpets as the priests carried the Ark of the Covenant around the city of Jericho. On the seventh day, the Israelites marched around the walls of Jericho seven times. At Joshua’s order, the men produced a powerful roar, and Jericho’s walls miraculously fell down. The Israelite army raced in quickly conquering the city and, as promised, only Rahab and her family were spared.
Just like the story of the battle of Jericho, you have to have persistence and strength and faith that with God on your side these walls don’t stand a chance. Be brave enough to knock them down knowing what the reward of letting something new and good flood in and conquer the fears that have laid claim to parts of who you are.
Often times it is far easier to battle the things life throws at us than the things that are within us. It is easy to distract yourself from your own flaws and heartaches with the struggles of the world. But we must remember to self maintain. Like a dead tree branch these walls that we have built up are restricting life from flowing through us. They are taking up energy preventing, protecting, blocking out, all of the wonderful things to fill us up.
The ugly truth is sometimes the only truth that can open our eyes and allow us to make a change and tear down a wall. Do not let it offend you or weaken you. Allow it to grow you and believe that just because it breaks does not mean it is broken. These walls falling are like conquered kingdoms in you. They are victories. They are meant to be celebrated. The amount of strength that it requires to actually CHANGE is a strength to be reckoned with.
Spend some time with yourself. It isn’t easy and it sure isn’t always pretty but the things you discover about who you are to your core, the things you decided you want to replace these built up walls with and the strength and emotional power that you will receive, will prepare you for the days to come. It will ready you for the hearts that you will comfort and the souls that you will speak light into. It will allow more joy to come through you and pour into those around you. Most importantly it will make room for God to move in you.
LET THEM FALL. Do not spend any more time or energy holding them up. Walls are meant to protect, I get it. Not every wall has to come down. You know which walls are either holding in toxic thoughts, emotions, and fears. You know which walls are good walls. The bad ones have to go. From now on these toxic walls that are feeding on your energy are viruses like COVID-19. They are confining us at home and driving us crazy. Ain’t nobody got time for that. Tear them down and bring in the best medicine, Jesus.
Removing these walls only leaves space for the precious love of God to fill. You deserve the freedom and the love of God. You are worthy. You are capable. You are driven. You are chosen. You are appreciated. You are acknowledged. You are precious. You are a child of the one true King and it is time we march around our walls for God to move in our lives.
Declare these positive things over your life. Meditate on them and be blessed sweet friends.
xoxo
