Tearing Down in order to Build Up

           I was recently going through the some old paper’s trying to find some something for a Christmas gift I’m working on when I came across a homemade book I’d made as a teenager. In it I’d compiled a bunch of different writings I’d written at the time. 

I cried my way through the whole thing.  A few because of the memories they evoked, but other’s because they convicted me of a sin I hadn’t wanted to see.

                As a teen I keenly felt the emotions of those around me. Now that I am older I know that it was because God has gifted me with the gift of empathy, but at the time I didn’t know how to process all of the emotions that I constantly felt bombarding me. I had the wacky mood swings and changes of a teenage girl plus those I’d pick up from people around me. 

I could barely stand to be around people, other than my family, for more than a couple days at a time because I’d feel so drained and tired. I think this stemmed from personality as an introvert, but I believe my ability to perceive other’s emotions also played a part. It wasn’t until I was older that I learned to build a wall against other’s emotions making it easier to deal with more people for longer periods of time. Plus, I finally left the hormones of my teenage years behind making life so much easier!

Reading through my old writings one in particular hit me hard. It was the one that brought me to my knees in tears and sorrow. I want to share it with you today in order to show what God was doing in my heart then and now (be forewarned it’s not very well written).

A Whispering Wind

A whisper in the wind, a voice
              calling me to some place unknown.
              A whisper in the wind, some voice
              is gently whispering in my ears
             the hurts of others.

A whisper in the wind is gently
              calling me to a place I know
           not where.

A voice in the wind is calling my name
           to heal the hurts of others.

Who is calling me to these places?
              Who’s voice am I hearing in the wind
               wind gently calling my name?
               Who but God can whisper on the wind
             to tell me the hurt of another?

So as I hear Him calling I answer,
             “Through a heart full of pain for another
              you are calling, so I will go
            as you tell me; to a world of broken hearts
           I will go to help heal another.”

                God had been working in my heart as teen to help those who were hurting and broken. I had no idea how he wanted to use me only that he had burden my heart with the hurts of others. I believe that God gives each of us gifts and talents to in order to carry out the plans he has for our lives. He had given me empathy for a reason and he was calling me towards a plan greater than myself, but this is also the point where here sin first started to creep in. 

I began building walls and constructing a shell around my heart to keep the pain out. It hurt too much to constantly feel that others were hurting and be unable to do anything about it. Soon I became impervious to much of the brokenness around me. I no longer felt the call to mend broken and battered lives. I didn’t even notice the call was gone at first because I was reveling in the silence of my own heart. I longer felt as though I was constantly battered about from emotions on all sides or that I would break down and cry in the solitariness of my room every time I came in contact with someone who was broken. 

Over time I began to notice though. Something would happen and my heart wouldn’t be moved the way it used to be. It bothered me a little but not enough to change. I knew what lay on the other side my wall and I didn’t want to go there. I prayed that God would soften my heart to the things that broke his, but only if I could keep most of my wall, I was willing to let some of it go, but not all of it.

I think God began a long time ago to chip away at my wall. Breaking down little pieces here and there, slowly tearing down the shell I had hid behind for so long. I think the first big break through came when I started writing again. I’d given up writing somewhere in my late teens. Nothing I ever wrote had seemed right to me and the creativity I’d had before seemed to have dried up and left, and yet two years ago on cold day in March God prodded me to write again and this time, instead of pen and paper, I picked up a computer and started a blog. 

I never had any intention of starting a blog and yet somehow in the space of a day and half I suddenly had one. I believe this where God first started his some of his biggest work within my life. He showed me things about the world around me that I had failed to notice for years and he gave me back a passion for the broken and hurting once again. 

Yet I still resisted letting my walls completely down, but God didn’t let up. Despite my stubbornness he continued his relentless pursuit of me. He kept bringing people, books, and events into my life that slowly forced me to crack the shell I had hidden in for so long.

Today on the floor of my bedroom I cried tears of guilt and sorrow as I realized for the first time what I had done. I had never seen my walls as a sin. To me they were a means of protection and comfort, but in building my walls I had stifled the voice of God. 

This past month God has been chiseling away at my walls harder than he has in years. I can feel them crumbling around me and you know what? I found that I much prefer this side of the wall. Yes, I feel like I might cry over everything and my heart hurts more than it has in a long time but I’ve come to realize that it’s okay. God is breaking my heart for what breaks his and I want it no other way. 

I like to hide myself from the world in order to protect myself from pain and hurt, but I can’t hide if I’m to be part of God’s work. I need to be all in even when it hurts, even when there’s joy and when there’s pain. I can’t half-heartedly do the will of God. He is calling me to part of something greater but in order to truly be a part of this great work God is calling all of me even the part that still suffers from sin and imperfection. He knows I’m not perfect and I never will be. All he’s asking is that I truly try each day to be like him; every day shedding a little more of the old me in order to grow into the person he’s calling me to be. It’s not going to easy and it’s going to hurt but in the end I’m guaranteed it’s going to be worth it.

I still have a long ways to go in tearing down walls, especially since three quarters of the time I don’t even notice they’re there. However, God knows what needs to go, so as long as I am pliable he’ll work in me and together we’ll continue to tear down the things that hinder me from fully following him.