Building Altars of Testimony (Walls to Altars part 2)

A weekly wisdom

Last week, I shared about how God had shown me an image of my life as a labyrinth of massive walls; walls built of lies, doubts, anger, fear, and sin; walls that he wanted to tear down.

This started a journey of challenging internalized assumptions I’d made about God and myself.

As an example, while I knew in my head that God was with me, my heart told me I’d been abandoned and forgotten. As I repented and rejected that lie, I felt the truth of his presence ever with me.

After a couple of years of this journey of breaking down walls, the Lord showed me the labyrinth again. But this time, the walls directly around me had been destroyed. While there were still plenty to go, I now stood on a massive mount of rubble.

But here’s some honesty for you. As I stood in the remains of who I thought I was and my once tight comfort zone, the place now looked like a complete mess. Where once stood tall and gleaming towers of white stone, now lay piles of debris and a huge cloud of dust. Maybe it’s just the organizer in me, but at least before the place was clean and orderly.

There were things I made apart of my identity, that had been exposed as lies I had told myself. The pride about my intellect had been exposed as insecurity, which had caused me to put down others. My extreme introversion had been exposed as a coping mechanism because I didn’t have many friends. My cautious nature had been exposed as a strange rebellion against my adventure seeking family.

“So who am I?” I asked God.

“Let’s find out together.” I could feel the warmth of his response. “To start, I want you to do something - take this rubble and build an altar to me.”

My mindset about becoming Christlike had become very task oriented. Break wall number one, then two, then three, and so on. I had lost track of letting God complete each work in me. I had forgotten to stop and be in awe of how God was moving.

And so I went over to the rubble from one of the walls, I started with the one that represented the lie that I would never have real friends unless I was doing things for them. I grabbed each jagged piece of stone that had once loomed so high over my head; and I built an altar.

I worshiped God at the altar, in awe and wonder at how he’d provided with true relationships and connections. What once was an insurmountable wall was now a testimony of God’s work in my life.

As I move forward, my journey is to continue to let God break down each wall until all that is left is altars of testimony covering the landscape of my life.

What are some of the walls in your life that God has turned into a testimony of his faithfulness?