Breaking Down the Wall

     Here it is, here I am, again. I find myself in this place all too often. Feeling a distance, a distance I know I’ve created. Here I am staring at a wall, an all too familiar wall, a wall that keeps getting higher and higher. It’s unclimbable now. What am I supposed to do? I stand there, staring at it, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for something to move or to be said. I wish I had the words or the actions to do something… but my mind is blank and my ability to move is gone.

     After days, weeks of staring, of just going, I start to hear something… something that’s unfortunately very familiar and very much unwanted...

     “Hannah is alone. Alone and unwanted. Alone, unwanted and falling out of control. Hannah will be forever alone and forever forgotten.”

     Oh the things I hear inside my head make me burn with anger. I become angry because I know that what is being said isn’t true. It’s all a lie. I am not alone, for God is with me. I am wanted, God wants me, He has plans for my life. He is in control, therefore I will never be let go. I am not alone or forgotten.

     But then why? Why do I feel so alone and unwanted? Why do I feel like I am slowly losing all sanity? WHY AM I  STILL STARIING AT THIS WALL?

     I see it everywhere. In different ways, with different people. I see the pain, confusion, depression and loneliness. I see people looking for answers, looking for ways out, looking for things to fill those huge holes within us. I see it everywhere.  In my family and friends, even amongst the strangers I walk past. I see it everywhere, yet it’s unheard of. I see it everywhere, but I am the only person who has it.

It’s the unspoken secret.

     So I sit here thinking about why it’s such a secret, why it hurts so much if it’s such a lie, and why do we even have God and people in our lives if we never connect with them and share what’s truly in our hearts. Aren’t we called to share each other’s burdens?  

     I’ve been back in Canada for six months now and I feel more alone then I did when I first arrived home. But I know that this is just as much my fault as it is anyone else’s.  How can I share about who I am and what I am struggling with when no one around me does? How can I open up if I don’t feel comfortable? Again I am attacked with lies, because there are people who share, but am I listening to them. And who cares if you’re comfortable or not, God calls me to be transparent and live in the light. Yes I know easier said than done, but am I living for myself or God? Am I living to please my neighbour or God?

     So now I ask myself, how do I break down this wall and live in the freedom God has for me? As I think answer for me become clear.  Right now my answer is to share my struggles, my fears and even my desires, I need to be transparent.

     So here I go, wall breakdown part one. The painful process of being transparent.

     Since grade 11, I have struggled with reading sexually graphic romance novels (I believe this is a form of porn for a woman) and masturbation. I am imperfect, but I know that God has forgiven me and that together He and I will get through, and one day I will be completely free. It’s unfortunately a huge temptation in my life still today, but I continue to bring it to the cross.

    A fear that I have is that I will be forever alone. Unfortunately, like a lot of woman, I struggle with feeling not very beautiful, I think more on the weight side of things. I have always felt that if I was just a little bit smaller… unfortunately I just can’t give up chocolate. But I fear being single for the rest of my life, even though everyone tells me I won’t and that being single is good and to enjoy it and blah, blah, blah. God and I are working at this, and I know that all I need is Him, so I am working to be okay with that. But again, it’s hard and it’s huge.

     And last but not least, one of my biggest desires is why I am writing this. I want to be transparent with people, because I want people to be transparent to me. I want to be able to help people, to listen, to love. I have a desire to reach out to people and to love them fiercely, no matter who they are or what they’ve been through. But it’s hard when you don’t first open up.

     So there you go, part one (for I am sure there will be other parts). When I sat down this morning to write, I had no idea that this is what I had in my head or heart. But I know God has a plan, and He speaks to me so much through my own writings. My prayer is that He would speak to your heart and that you would open up to someone and share what’s really in your heart.

Oh Lord, inspire us all to be transparent.

What am I fighting for?

     We are constantly fighting.  There is always a battle going on. In our mind, our heart, even right before us in reality. I feel like I am always fighting. The question I found myself thinking about is what am I fighting for? Am I fighting for my own plans and desires, the desires of my flesh? Or am I fighting for the plans and desires of the Holy One?

     What am I fighting for?

     I have found that it is so much easier to fight for the desires of my flesh then to fight for the desires of the Holy One. I always start on the right side; listening for Him to speak to me, to direct me, waiting for Him to plant in my heart His plans. But once He does that. I stop listening. What happens to a solider when He stops listening to the commands of his commander?

     I find myself only ever listening to the first command. After I hear that first command, after He shows me a glimpse of His heart, I stop listening. I begin to make my own plans, based off of what He has said, but I no longer leave room for His direction. So very quickly I find myself changing sides. I find myself fighting for what I want, for what I desire. And all too quickly I find myself fighting against the One who I wanted to be fighting with.

     “Seek, inquire for, and require for the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his ways and the unrighteous man His thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have love, pity and mercy for him, and to our God, He will multiply to him His abundant pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, say the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:6-9

     His abundance of mercy and grace leave me in awe. I fight against Him so often, most times not even realizing that I am doing it, but even then, He oh so gently reminds me to call upon Him and that my ways, my thought are not His.

New Beginnings

     “Hannah, don’t build me into your life. Instead build your life around me.”

This was something God spoke to me a while back, but at that time I didn’t understand why He was saying it to me. 

     Change happens in a blink of an eye. Everything that was once familiar to you has changed and you have to start again, from scratch. It’s not a bad thing; to be honest it’s actually something I wanted.  To be in a situation where the only thing familiar to you is God and the only thing you have around you that you can cling to is God. He’s the only thing that didn’t change when you blinked, but then, Satan and his lies haven’t changed… have they?

      So now starting from scratch, what do I choose? How am I going to rebuild my life? What are my options, what do I want?  And then I found myself in a place of confusion and pain. That is when the ever present, ever constant voice spoke and said something every familiar ‘Hannah, don’t build me into your life. Instead build your life around me’. The same words spoken to me in March, while I was home visiting Canada.  Now here I am four months later trying to rebuild my life in the very place the Lord spoke those words to me.

     My response? ‘Lord teach me, show me how to build my life around you, I am yours forever and always’.

I Am Taken Care Of

“If you never take a step of faith, you never get to see the Lords faithfulness.”

     Sometimes it’s hard to take that step, to be like Peter and step outside of the boat.  Sometimes stepping outside of the boat means letting go and putting things at the foot of the cross, all of your control gone. Maybe it even hurts. But there is something that happens when we step outside of what we know and what is comfortable.  There is a release.

And that release is the Lords faithfulness.

     The Lord has been so faithful to me in the last year in many different areas in my life. But there has always been one area that I never really had to depend on God for and that was the area of my finances. I have been blessed to grow up in Canada and to always have an abundance of money, from job’s and family, even friends.  So I have never had to let God take control of this area and depend on Him for financial needs. 

      But after being in mission for the last year and a bit I have slowly ran out of that which I had saved.  And in the moment that I had nothing left the Lord asked me to step out of the boat and walk to Him.  It was easy to step out of the boat, I tend to have a lot of faith, but after I step out it’s very easy for me to take my eyes off the Lord and I begin to sink. But in that moment when you step out in faith that is when the Lord’s faithfulness is released.  You’re saying you trust Him, sometimes it’s just for a moment, but that moment is enough and He doesn’t forget that moment. In the past two and a half months I have had many moments where my faith lacked and I didn’t trust that the Lord was in control.  But it was always after those moments when I lacked faith that the Lord would reach out and show me he was faithful and that he was the ultimate provider.

    My step of faith was huge (for me), but He has been faithful and provided everything I needed. All the glory and honor to Him!

Simple Thoughts

There is nothing I like better then to hear the voice of the one you love. To hear him tenderly speaking out why he loves you or to hear him speaking about the plans he has your future together.  There is something so special and important about his words that make you want to listen.

    That is how I feel about the Lord and his words to me. I can’t go a day without hearing His soft still voice speaking tenderly to me about anything and everything. To hear Him speaking to me about the future, about another person or about His love for me, it is absolutely beautiful.

     To hear the voice of God is so important to your relationship with Him. Can you have intimacy with someone you don’t ever talk to? Can you have a relationship with someone if you’re the only person talking? I don’t believe you can have real, true intimacy without those things. It's what makes something special.

In the Chaos, Surrender All

     His grace is sufficient for me and His power is made perfect in my weakness.  These are the promises I have been holding on to during the last week.  It has been a long time since I felt so spiritually attacked. My mind has been the biggest mess, the largest battle was fought there and now there are things everywhere.

     But what I have learned during this is that surrendering is the key to winning the battle. I know it doesn’t sound like a very strategic plan, but in the mist of this battle it was my only option. The Lord is so great, so powerful and strong.  When I say surrender I don’t mean surrender to the enemy you are fighting, but surrender to the Lord.  Surrender all control.  In your power the battle will never be won. But in His power the battle is already won.

     I don’t know why we have to go through the things we go through, but if we didn’t go through the hard times we wouldn’t need God and we wouldn’t grow. In the mist of all the overwhelming chaos, God is there, willing and able to take it all. We don’t need to feel trapped, lost or confused. God is there. Mightier than all the chaos, bigger than your storm.  Surrendering all to Him will bring the most beautiful freedom you will ever experience.