This… was me.I was a college student doing a self portrait for my photography class. As I tried to brainstorm ways to illustrate who I was in one photograph, this was all I could see…This was who I had become. This was all I knew. This was how I walked my life for as long as I could remember.
Let me introduce you to my life that was undeniably overrun with fear. Night after night I would lay in my bed as a child and the most terrifying thoughts would play through my head-images of things that surprise me to this day. Scenarios, sicknesses, devastation-it never ended and I never found a place of peace. My mom and dad would comfort me if I expressed what was on my mind. But more often than not, I would silently sit all by myself in the pool of fear I had grown accustomed to. This was just my “normal”.
As I grew up, Fear continued to grow as well. It gripped my life in a choke hold. In every way possible my life was controlled by this ever growing spirit-even in the good moments, it somehow convinced me there were things to be afraid of there too. No part of my life was left untouched.
As I grew up, Fear continued to grow as well. It gripped my life in a choke hold. In every way possible my life was controlled by this ever growing spirit-even in the good moments, it somehow convinced me there were things to be afraid of there too. No part of my life was left untouched.
Walking through the doors of a church in 2014 was terrifying to say the very least. I was starting this adventure alone with my two kids at the time, walking into a space where I knew no one. Even though many things changed for me after that day, the fear did not. For years after, I still carried this baggage with me. It morphed into new fears with each season of my life. My children were an easy target…the smallest thought sent me into a spiral and on more than one occasion I would find myself sitting in their rooms at night because I was afraid to let them out of my sight. Simple tasks like eating in front of people sent me into a panic. I was always quiet but eventually I never wanted to be around anyone more than I had to. Even at church, I would avoided talking to people and eye contact didn’t happen if I could help it. I was that person who would leave after service as quickly as I could (preferably unnoticed) Day after day iImages would continuously flash through my head that would leave me in a hopeless bondage.
I can’t tell you there was any “ah ha” moment for me. What I can tell you is that little by little, step by step, Jesus walked with me. He peeled away layer after layer and replaced it with His truth and love. “I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.” Psalms 34:4 Slowly the chain of fear began to break and one link at a time, it fell to the ground. In 2016 when I made the choice to be baptized, I was finally able to stand in front of my church family and declare that I was no longer walking a life of fear but I was walking in the freedom that Jesus died for. The final cuff around my wrists fell to the ground that day as I spoke those words out loud.
Friends, I won’t tell you that the familiar knock on my door doesn’t happen often. What I can tell you is by the power of Christ and the Holy Spirit who walks with me, I can recognize that knock and refuse to answer. I can tell you that it is in His strength that I can stand on the promises in the Bible (that can only be found by reading it often) and know the battle has already been won at the cross. I can tell you that in the moments fear tries to sneak in, I can claim the freedom Jesus died for and watch fear run for the hills by the power of the name JESUS. “But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and no t grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” Isaiah 40:31
YOU do not have to live in fear. No matter what is happening around us-yesterday, today or tomorrow, God’s Word is true. I have walked it and so can you. Call on him today. Call out his name. Let HIM do what you have perhaps tried to do over and over again without success on your own… It is HIS power and HIS power alone that breaks chains.
Over the years, I have come across this picture and contemplated throwing it out. But it is a constant reminder of the very real prison I once lived in, in comparison to the very real freedom where I now walk. That is a something I never want to throw away.
“He brought them out of darkness, the utter darkness, and broke away their chains.” Psalms 107:14
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