The Grocery Doors

I wish I could take credit for the word picture I'm about to give you to think about, but the original story comes from Joy Chickonoski, and sharing it with you is confirmation of a prayer time I had last month. When I was prayed for the person shared that I am a scribe (true) and that I absorb what I see, say and learn so that I can share it with others. Well I remember this story, and it's a perfect fit for what my child went through earlier this week.

Typically our oldest gets home at 3:15. Yesterday, the first day of school, 3:15 came and no child. At 3:25, my phone rang. It was him and he missed the bus. No problem, we live close by and I got him.

When we got home though, he fell apart. He was scared enough that he couldn't remember our phone number and that threw him into a panic. He thought he was in trouble. Once he was safely home he realized he had to go through the same process again. Maybe the bus situation would work out, maybe not.

With that, the whispers started. I bet you know them too.

"You're going to have a bad day."

"You'll never figure this out."

"You're going to fail."

"You have no business doing this."

By dusk, he was doubled over with stomach cramps and a headache. Fear had a vise grip on him. We went for a walk and together we prayed the fear would be sent packing in Jesus' name. Taking a step further, I felt God asking me to pray that the generational curse of fear over our family would be destroyed in Jesus' name.

For us, this means I can trace back to my life, one of my parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and other family members from both sides who carried/carry fear in their choices. My own example was as a child was I was so scared of art that I would hardly sleep the night before. When my alarm clock would sing, I judged whether the art day would go well on how fast I could get the numbers back to zero. I was desperate for reassurance and full of fear.

I boldly stand under His authority and claim the fear cycle stops yesterday.

But just because the fear was renounced, does everything magically disappear? Not in my case, and so far, not in our son's. We have to choose to believe faith is the victor. We can't choose both fear and faith. But when you're ten and you aren't sure the bus is going to be there for you, what do you do?

Well here is where we need to visualize the grocery doors. You know the automatic doors that nter as soon as you step on the mat? Well that's faith. Do you ever worry about those grocery doors opening? Probably not. You believe they will open and they do.

So it is with life with Christ at the helm. You can't see what comes around the corner, but you have to trust He is there. You have to trust He's in control of that bus coming, that diagnosis being under His care, those finances provided for, whatever it is, He's that grocery door.

How about you? Are you still listening to those nasty whispers and believing the lies? Are you approaching your faith like automatic grocery doors or Fort Knox?

It's a choice.

Just so you know, as hard as I prayed for him, 3:30 came today and went with no child. No call either. My heart knew he was on the bus or I would have a call. My stomach cranked out the waves of panic rising. I literally had to picture open grocery doors and speak truth as I encouraged my son to do. I did call the bus garage to make sure at 3:45 all was well, and I learned the driver didn't see him in the back and missed him on the route and left him for last. He came home happy and stress free. I chose faith, eventually, so I'm learning right with you!

Julie Arduini is a surrendered writer with her own blog, http://thesurrenderedscribe.blogspot.com/. A graduate of the Christian Writers Guild, she also blogs for the Christian Writers Forum Sundays as the mommy blogger. She is active with FaithWriters and has several writings ready to publish in different books and anthologies in 2008-09. One of the books will be a quote in Kathy Vick's Simon and Schuster/Howard's gift book, "Run Like a Girl."You can also find Julie the third Thursday of each month over at Take Root and Write with her column, Finding Freedom through Surrender. She facilates a group by the same name at the sister social networking site, Christian Women Take Root.