Are You Willing To Give What You Don’t See a Try

Hello Readers, I hope you enjoyed last week’s blog post! Let’s get into this week’s post. I hope you can take something back from what you read here today.
 
Are You Willing to Give What You Don’t See a Try?
 
My healing journey has really been my walk with God, as He is the ultimate healer.
 
Now, whether you’re a believer or not, I invite you to read this with an open mind.  
 
Despite growing up in the church, I never had a relationship with God. That is, until I hit my rock bottom in 2014, and cried out to God for His help. From that day forward, it has been a ride!
 
The thing is, church in my time was a very serious thing. We got picked up every Sunday, in a big yellow school bus organized by Uncle Ted, and we went to Sunday school. Sunday school consisted of church songs, reading the scripture and a snack, right before getting back on the school bus to go home. However, I struggle to remember if we ever learned the importance of having a relationship with God, or spiritual warfare, which is like the introduction to following God based on my experience.

I had fun going, and I must say that it helped to keep me grounded. But, ultimately, it was just the thing to do on Sunday for me, so sometimes the message of the service wasn’t received.
 
As always, on this platform, I do my best to keep it transparent; therefore with that being said, I have to add that my faith was nowhere as strong as it is today. I admit that I was reluctant to go on this walk with God. With all of the loses in my life, I questioned God so many times growing up, and, like I expressed before in another blog, I stopped believing in God in my late teenage years.
 
In retrospect, I felt like God let me down over the years. Despite praying every night, much like my Grandparents encouraged me to do, and despite going to church every Sunday, and doing my best to be a decent human being, I was still met with so many losses. When you lose one person in life, it’s a struggle to recover for most people, so can you imagine coping with multiple loses? Then, on top of that, the teenage years of emotional instability –it was a lot.
 
So, when I decided to go on my walk with God, I was so nervous, as I knew that it would require my vulnerability, which was a major struggle for me.
 
A very wise woman in my life asked me if I was willing to give what I don’t see a try; and in a moment of desperation to feel better, I agreed to go on my walk with God. A God I had never seen, never felt, and didn’t quite understand. It was like being led blindfolded, trusting that when the blindfolds are lifted, that I would be fine.
 
The way God is wrapped in a beautiful package, and shared with people who are new to Him, one would believe that once you beginning walking with the Lord, that everything would be perfectly fine – not at all!
 
Walking with God in the beginning isn’t easy. It’s also a road less travelled, but, it’s one of the greatest roads you’ll ever voyage.
 
In the beginning, I was like an emotional roller coaster. My faith wavered every time something went wrong, and I got mad with God. I was having an emotional break down every week as I was developing my relationship with God. Since I was shedding the old me, and birthing a renewed version of myself, the growing pains weren’t ones I was used to managing.
 
Loneliness started to move into my daily space because as I was changing, not too many people around me were. The sense of belonging was fading. This was also the time when God was showing me that I had to let go of some very close relationships and situationships, and that too was a grieving process.
 
As much as I was walking with God, I struggled to trust Him, and the reason why—I know this now looking back—was because I was doing everything in my own strength. Instead of leaning on the word and prayer, I was focused on this independent “I can do it myself” kind of attitude, and that’s because I trusted myself only.
 
This doesn’t sound too convincing to someone considering walking with God, right!?
Don’t be discouraged though—it’s part of the process.
 
More into my walk with God, I realized that it’s mandatory to not lean on your own understanding if you want to grow spiritually. This was a reminder for me, and still is, when moments of frustration try to settle in my mind.
 
The more I developed my relationship with God, the more I learned to let go of what I couldn’t control. I started to take time with myself, and not allow my overthinking to lead me to believe I was lonely. I comprehended that in order for God to grow me up spiritually, sometimes it required solitude (keep in mind solitude is very different than isolation—but thats for another blog).
 
I learned to discern, and got real comfortable with letting go of any unhealthy relationships, and I did so with love. Correcting myself became easy to do, and standing up for myself without guilt was in practice—and now in the mastery stage—yes, God!
 
It’s also important to address that backsliding is also a real part of this process. Change is not easy—it’s inevitable that there will be times where we backslide. Every time I found myself circling back to old ways, it showed me what I still needed to work on, or heal from. This back and forth is a part of the process until we fully come under the armor of God.
 
Where Am I in my walk today?
 
Not where I want to be. However, I’m absolutely not where I used to be, and to me, that’s a blessing.
 
Despite growing up in the church, I never really had a relationship with God until I was 28 years old. I was definitely scared to trust in what I couldn’t see, but, I figured, if I gave other things a try that weren’t really the best for me, why not do something that would eventually be, such as building my faith.

One of the biggest lessons I learned from building my faith is that I have to believe and trust that His word will never go in vain.
 
From my journey to yours.
Keemah G