(Photo by imlauralphotography)
Is anybody else selling God short nearly every time they turn the corner? I find myself way too many times doubting myself. Am I doing this right? Should I have said this? Is this a terrible idea?
I only started this internship last week and I am already finding myself feeling like I am going to fail. This feeling of failure in my career didn’t just begin though. Starting in (about) March, I started hearing voices in my head telling me “you’re not good enough. You’re not creative. You’re ideas are cliche. Everything fails on you; maybe you should stop trying.” Every day they grew stronger and stronger. I began getting angry at God. 1) because I couldn’t seem to see Him anywhere or hear His voice. 2) because the very thing He had gifted me with was going down the drain. My editing had become so backed up that I became the photographer I told myself I would never be, and my videography wasn’t improving or even really taking off. My frustration grew from small disappointments, like forgetting to message someone back, being late to events, or even not being able to wake up as early as I wanted. I began blaming God for all of these, since He is obviously in control. I felt like I had the right to be angry. I cannot even tell you how many times I yelled at him in my car, or even just in my heart. I tried to dismiss the fact that I was angry because I never wanted to admit it to myself. I felt like I was disappointing God. So I told myself that I was just in a “dry” season, or not listening to Him (which is true), or just too distracted by school and friends. (If you should know anything about me, its that I have the hardest time admitting things to myself. Not just telling others that I do, I mean really and truly admitting to my head that I am wrong.)
I brought this same mindset with me to California. On the road trip before arriving, I found myself in somber moments of anger and insecurity. I tried to distract myself with clever Instagram captions and adventurous stories. Sometimes I try to be the person that the world sees and I forget about the parts that the world doesn’t see.
There have been several nights I have stayed up late staring at other people’s photographs and saying “wow, I wish I was like that.” I caused myself to go to bed angry and insecure. I keep thinking, “I’m in California, I should be having the time of my life, right? I mean, that’s what everyone keeps assuming.” It’s not the fact that I’m not having those moments, they are just surrounded by moments of a growing hardness in my heart. Every morning my head tells me to pick up my bible, but my hands just never seem to move. My heart tells me to cry out to God, but my thoughts become mute. I find myself feeling like I’m not only failing in my career but I am failing God and He’s seeing less of who I am because of it.
But somehow in the midst of my humanity, God prevails. Sometimes when we push Him away, He pushes Himself closer to us. In every song I’ve listened to these past couple of days, I’ve heard nothing but words of love.
This song came on my spotify radio and I have listened to it nearly every single morning. It contains part of a sermon by Graham Cooke and every part of God’s love.
“There is nothing you can do to make Him love you more. There is also nothing you can do that would make Him love you less. He loves you because He loves you because He loves you…He won’t love you any better when you become better. He loves you 100% right now. And even if you have no plans to become better, He will still love you 100%. Because He loves you and that’s they way that He is. And even if you don’t want to change, He will love you 100%. Even if you have no plans to walk with Him, He will love you 100%., because that’s His nature. He loves all the way…all the time. His love is unchanging.”
These words are LIFE. They constantly circulate in my thoughts. Even when I push Him away, He loves me 100%.
Sometimes God knows that you have blocked Him out of your head, so He chooses to reveal Himself through outside sources because it’s harder to look away.
He revealed Himself in another song, “Out of Hiding” by Steffany Gretzinger.
“Come out of hiding
You’re safe here with Me
There’s no need to cover
What I already see
You’ve got your reasons
But I hold your peace
You’ve been on lockdown
And I hold the key
’Cause I loved you before you knew it was love
And I saw it all, still I chose the cross
And you were the one that I was thinking of
When I rose from the grave
Now rid of the shackles, My victory’s yours
I tore the veil for you to come close
There’s no reason to stand at a distance anymore
You’re not far from home
No need to be frightened
By intimacy
No, just throw off your fear
And come running to Me”
During worship I just sat and listened. Something that I have neglected for a very long time. I hung on to each word and tried my best to keep myself from balling my eyes out in public. But all of a sudden the urge stopped, and I sat in peace and comfort. Eyes shut. Listening. No movement. Listening. I pushed away any distracting thought and simply listened.
And today, I found myself doubting again. I was on my way to a meeting with the guy I am working for. We were going to brainstorm about an upcoming video series, and I kept drawing blanks. I thought “If God brought me this internship, then why is He not helping?”
But to my surprise, the meeting went smoothly and he had already come up with ideas for me to capture. Then, God reminded me that I constantly try to do everything myself, figuratively and literally. If I do not put myself completely in God’s hands, then yes, I will fail, but if I surrender even my creativity, then nothing on earth will make me fall.
I’m not done struggling. I’m not done with insecurity. I’m not done accepting grace. But, the cement exterior around my heart is beginning to crack and I’m allowing the Holy Spirit to breathe through it until the rugged cement completely falls off.
As christians, we constantly find ourselves angry at the Lord because we have allowed our hearts to become so hard, but we forget that He is powerful enough to turn stone into the softest flesh.
My prayer is the same as it was four years ago when I set out to become someone with a heart of flesh. Moldable. Consumed with life. Constantly being filled with His spirit.
- His beloved, Hannah
