Shattering Idols

A few months ago, I was working on writing a second book about my cancer journey. It has taken many tears and probably will take years to write, as some events are hard to “relive” in my mind. It’s hard to summarize all that has happened, while giving context and detail to intimate and life-altering moments, all while giving a glimpse into who God is.

When I think back on my cancer journey, and really my heart journey for that matter too, when I heard the words, “We think you have cancer…” the idols in my life had no choice, but to be laid down, even though I wanted to cling to everything else to stay afloat. Everything I desperately tried to hold onto, was ripped away from me. I know that sounds dramatic, but anything I held in a higher regard than God, was forced to be shattered. There I sat the first evening on the cancer floor in Ann Arbor, alone. Shattered. Broken. Crying so deeply, a sound could barely come out at times. No extra clothes, just basically myself, nothing familiar from home, home was far away, and all I could hear were the beeps of my monitors in the background as I was recovering from a heart procedure and now preparing my body for chemo. I’ve never felt so “alone” in my life.

Then came in a nurse – he actually wasn’t even my nurse and to this day, I have no idea why he even came in – except that God sent him. I know word spread quickly about my situation on the cancer floor at U of M, but this was the middle of the night. He gently knelt down by my bed, looked directly at me and asked, “Are you okay?” Those 3 words cued the waterworks. I wasn’t okay. It was the middle of the night and it felt like everything secure in my life was thrown to the wind.

And to this day, I am so thankful for that moment because that’s exactly what we need sometimes – to be completely broken down so that idols can be shattered. Sometimes we have to live into the “not okay” so that we can rely on Christ and not ourselves.

Isn’t it often true that in our hardest moments, God breaks us down to the point where we have no other choice BUT to turn to Him? The things I wanted to cling to, held no eternal hope. The idols of possessions, my time, money, and ultimately, life going the way I want it to, all gone in a heartbeat. We can try and curate our lives to look the way WE want them to, but even in that, it can become an idol, when we try to only live to do what WE desire. In that moment, laying in a hospital bed, 2 1/2 hours away from home, knowing I won’t be going home in possibly a month (though it was only 2 1/2 weeks), and being told I couldn’t see our daughter (though they eventually made an exception due to the intensity of the situation), life wasn’t going the way I thought it was going to and wouldn’t for years to come.

Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

The moment we delight ourselves in the LORD and not in ourselves or anything of this world, we will realize our heart’s desire is HIS heart and desires. And that is where the blessings are. Ironically when we let go of the grip of this world, we find a peace that is unexplained. A joy that is exuberant. In HIM, is LIFE.

My friend, what has God allowed in YOUR life, that has forced you to let go of the idols that are sneakily standing in the way of a true relationship with God? True surrender? Ultimate blessings? When God’s desires become ours, we welcome peace, confidence, surrender, joy, and a life filled with purpose that the world can’t offer.