Just Keep Walking

I have been struggling for years.  I never could quite put my finger on it...but the struggle was real. There has always been an emptiness in me that I couldn't quite understand.  A huge gaping hole in my soul.  I tried to fill it for years with a great number of things.  I tried to fill it with alcohol, I tried to fill it with relationships, I tried to fill it with food, I tried to fill it with work, I tried to fill it with friendships, I even tried to fill it with Jesus.  I find myself at 41 years old, still dealing with this huge gaping hole in my soul.  

I have only begun to find the ability to put words to it in the last two months.  I just always felt it there.  Not quite knowing why it hurt so bad or why the ache of it wouldn't go away.  The huge gaping hole in my heart is where God's love for me belongs.  I've just never felt it.  I want to believe that He loves me.  I know what all of the scripture says about His great love for me.  I love Him with all of me.  Oh how I love Him.  My heart's desire is to share His love with the world...but I also want to feel it right here in my heart.  

I laid in bed one night a few weeks ago.  I cried out to God and asked Him to show me how to find His love for me.  I asked Him to lead me to the right friend, or the right podcast, or the right scripture, or the right song, or the right anything...that would help me feel His love. 

The next morning, I was listening to a weekly devotional from Bianca Olthoff and she was talking about Joshua and the battle of Jericho.  She was talking about how the attack plan for this battle wasn't armory, wasn't more men, wasn't an attack at all...it was simply to walk around the walls.  In that moment, I felt like the Lord said to me, "Holly, you can't attack this the way that you've attacked other things in your life.  There is nothing you can do. You simply have to walk and trust me."  It was that simple, and that incredibly difficult.   A few weeks later, I was on a 7 1/2 mile hike through the wilderness, listening to worship music, praising His name and that's when it occurred to me that He is also meant that I was supposed to walk....like physically...like get off my butt and walk. Spend some time in the quiet with Him.  That simple, and that incredibly difficult.

Tonight, I was thinking about how I've always had to work hard for what I wanted.  God said to me, "Not this time.  There is no work necessary on your part.  I give my love freely to you, you just have to let it in.  You just have to be willing to let down that massive wall that you put between Me and that heart of yours.  Walk...and the wall will fall.  Just stay the course."

I am believing that today friends.  I am believing that if I just keep putting one foot in front of the other, that huge gaping hole will be filled by His incredible love for me.  The love that I've read so much about.  The love that I can so easily explain to others.  The love that I so desperately need to feel. 

I am also believing that I am not the only God loving person who feels this way.  God has asked me to let down the mask, and to be transparent as I walk this out.  Obedience above all else.  If there is even a part of you that struggles with feeling His love, will you walk this out with me?