A Guarded Heart

¨A heart. A guarded heart.¨ Those were the first words that Alyssa spoke in the listening prayer. This prayer is special in that the speaker had no idea who they were praying for and it was so early in our training camp sessions that none of us got to know each other on a deep level quite yet. In order to do this prayer there needs to be two circles. The inside circle closes their eyes and must listen to whatever God is telling them. The outer circle moves around and finds a person to put their hands on. I think this moment will forever change my life. For years, I have put up a giant barrier around my heart. I´ve been guarding it for a long time- afraid of being hurt, always being skeptical, and always questioning everything around me. Nobody, not even God, was truly able to entirely break through my barrier.

I´ve been hurt before, maybe that was where my first construction of my walls started to take place. In middle school, I was told I was ugly, fat, too good, dressed funny, and it didn´t help that I grew into puberty a lot faster than most of my peers. Friends were always coming and going and the teasing and anger was constant. That left huge scars that I still have an internal conflict with today. Since college has started, I have met amazing people and friends. I´ve started to learn how to trust, but it generally takes me a long time to open my heart.

The only variable left out of the equation was God. I still believed, but I was definitely becoming more distances from Him. Doubts started creeping in, I became more involved with other things in my life that I wasn´t taking any time to silence the noise and clutter I had made for myself. It wasn´t until during training camp that I realized I was carrying so much worries, guilt, and burdens in my life that I felt unworthy of God´s love. I´ve felt so ashamed of myself that I felt that I didn´t deserve any love: Not from relationships with friends, not from family, and especially not from God.

So I hid. I started closing myself off from the world. I started growing in other obsessions- because without a true, loving relationship there were no worries of getting hurt. I enveloped myself in other worlds on television and books. I buried myself in my music. In general, I was trying to silence the guilt and pain that had built throughout the years. I still wasn´t happy. All these things are great, but not when they were overtaking something that I greatly needed.

The things that I had put first in my life were actually VERY detrimental to me. I was so engaged in the lives of these imaginary people, I wasn´t living my own. I saw these beautiful and skinny actors/actresses and lost sight of my own beauty. And most importantly, I was missing out on the love and beauty of what God was offering up to me the entire time.

If I learned anything from training camp and my short time spent in Nicaragua so far, it is that God is here. During one of the worships of training camp- when I finally decided it was time to start dropping down my walls; to let God chip away at this almost invincible infrastructure I have wrapped around my soul, He embraced me. I felt God wrap his arms around me and say, ¨Welcome, you´re here!¨

I remember another time when God embraced me as a child. I am scared of storms. As a kid, I would get sick and throw up when storms were in the area. One morning, there was a massive storm system passing through. I sat alone, in a rocking chair, extremely afraid and feeling sick to my stomach, and I began to pray. I asked God for everyone to be okay. I asked Him to protect the crops (farm girl, eh?), and I asked him to protect the farm and my family, as well as, myself. In the instant that I finished my prayer- still terrified, I felt an embrace. Goosebumps rose on my arms, but it was warm and kind, and I instantly felt safe and calm.

How could I have such a close experience with God but have so many doubts? How could I have forgotten?

The answer is because I wasn´t listening and offering myself up to the Lord. I did this week, once again, fully, with 100% of my soul. You know what? I´ve never been happier. Even with a swarm of gnats, even with sunburns, even with bugs suddenly attacking , and even with storms on a daily basis here in Nicaragua. I´ve never been more calm, because I know the Lord will get me through all of it and HE WILL ALWAYS BE HERE. He may not answer right away or when I want him to, but He does answer. I just need to learn how to listen again. The best thing I have learned is that God accepts me for me. He loves me. He embraced me. He is calling for me. He´s calling for all of his beloved children- and the most amazing part is He finds us beautiful.

Acts 2:21 ¨And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.¨