AT THE ONSET OF MY wilderness journey I fought, with confidence and great assurance against the circumstances that landed me there. After two years, I was defeated.
I came to the end of my resources and was financially, emotionally, intellectually, and physically exhausted. For the next three years, up against a wall, I kicked, screamed, and begged God to part the Red Sea so I could get back to my normal life.
When that didn’t happen, I accused the Lord of not caring about me.
Do you not care if I die?
Does my life not matter to you?
Does not my loyalty, faithfulness, and service to you count for anything?
Are you not concerned about your own reputation?
It was the first time, since I met Jesus almost thirty years ago, that I doubted God was really omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent.
Which is to say I doubted he was big enough for my circumstances.
Maybe this was one of the reasons he led me out of my church to be alone with him without formal Bible studies and other things to do.
Or maybe he led me out of the church because I’m pretty sure if I heard one more person tell me, ‘God is all you need’ or ‘God has a purpose in your suffering’, I think the church lady may have killed someone.
If you are old enough to read this, you have walked into the valley of the shadow of death before.
You know when you are there because you have awakened, no longer sleeping through your competent unconscious days, but you are fully present to your conscious mind.
Which is alerting you that your hair is on fire.
Knowing what to do next depends on your prior experience with demons.
Demons are quite interesting. They are as real as the air we breathe. Anyone who has recovered from the bondage in which they were held captive knows this. Demons never enter our lives with horns and a tail in a red suit. That would be too obvious.
Demons are tricky little devils, showing up as a person, place, or thing. They are always right on time, and always with a promise to deliver some kind of relief to their victims, which they usually do.
That’s why they are kept around.
They not only titillate one’s flesh, but they also speak. Most of all, demons can temporarily mend a broken heart; a heart shattered by shame, humiliation, guilt, disappointment, unmet expectation, or fear.
As a child, the demon could come as a bowl of ice cream, delivered by the hand of a mother after an exasperating event on the schoolyard. By the time fatso enters middle school—and ice cream is not the solution for the bigger problem of fitting in with friends—the demon will return with another solution.
The demon could also come as a little gold star to a child who relished the praise and attention of her teacher after being neglected by her busy parents.
Hooked by feelings of superiority, intelligence, and accomplishment, she will keep this demon as a trusted friend.
One day the child becomes an adult and abruptly finds that his or her dream of finally being free, independent, and self-sufficient is not only an illusion but also a nightmare. Oh shirt! Now what am I going to do?
Not to worry at this moment of consciousness, though incompetent consciousness, for the demon is not far away.
In an authoritative voice the demon whispers:
Do not worry, for you shall not die.
Did not God make you in his image?
Did God not say you could move mountains?
Eat from this tree of the knowledge of good and evil and YOU shall know the way to your deepest desires.
I have come to believe that God has chosen our demons, as anyone in recovery from a demon will also attest.
Perfectly designed for the circumstances in our lives and our unique personalities at any given time, they lead us back to that first moment of loss; that first moment when we felt vulnerable, alone, and unequipped; that first moment of decision about how to get back to the safety found in slumber.
That place where we want to be numb to all unwanted feelings of either very real problems, or simply the boredom and tedium of routine life.
Rinse and repeat is the cycle of life.
We wake up and then we slumber.
Rinse and repeat provides the lessons in life. And at the end of each cycle, as the next one begins, we are not only met with our demons, but with God, who said he put within the heart of every man to know him. Jeremiah 24:7
They both whisper the same message: Follow me. I know the way.
Herein lies a choice, as if the lessons are nothing but a test. We can choose the way of our demons or, if we are ready, we can choose the way of God. Each lesson is God’s escape plan from the road that always leads to death.
It would appear to be a simple choice, especially for a church lady, but in my valley of all valleys, where I was up against a wall with nowhere to turn, the Lord revealed my favorite demon speaking the lies I had for so long believed. And then he declared that in order for me to live, my demon must die.
It was the most painful day in my journey, the day he introduced me to myself.
There is a way that seems right to a man and appears straight before him, but at the end of it is the way of death. Proverbs 16:25 (Amp)
1 John 4:1, 2 Corinthians 3:1-18, Nehemiah 9:20, Job 32:8-9, 1 Corinthians 2:11-14, John 4:10-14
As always, it is my intent and hope that my words may encourage you wherever you are in your journey.
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