Do you ever think back about your childhood and have a particular story that stands out to you? As you all know, I have plenty of stories, but this one particular story is etched in my mind. It freaks me out just thinking about it. I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and can just see the whole scenario playing out just like it did 40+ years ago.

I need you to picture in your mind: four girls, long dresses, long hair, no make-up or jewelry to accessorize in any way. What you saw is what you got. For church, we dressed up and looked presentable, well, usually!

Somedays, I felt like I looked ok. Other days, I just couldn’t even! So, when we were home, we looked frumpy, to say the least. Not trying to impress, just “doin’ our thing.” This day, I was not caring what I looked like or what anyone thought.

SO MY CHURCH (BRAT) STORY begins:

My other two older sisters and I started the day off as usual. It was a Saturday, so we were up early to clean, do laundry, cook, and make sure to be ready for church by evening.

One of us would get the clothes out of the dryer and fold what needed folded and put away for the laundry chore. If it required ironing, we would throw it in a basket, and someone knew to iron that basket load of clothes before day’s end.

For some reason, I loved to iron. I would usually volunteer for that chore. We were suppose to take turns because we ironed everything! Pillowcases, shirts, pants, jackets, handkerchiefs, when I say everything, it was everything that could possibly have a wrinkle anywhere on its premises! For me, it was just so satisfying to see something wrinkled, and then “Bam” it was smooth!

I usually didn’t mind the ironing. Also, it was a great time for me to escape in my mind with my thoughts. That should have been a task you could do without much thought of what you were doing!!! But in all transparency, there were times I would be lost in my thoughts and would smell something burning, and sure enough, it looked like the iron was still on the garment. I would forget to move it back and forth, and it would burn the garment! The ironing spray we used was pretty stiff, and you had to keep the iron moving.

Let me tell you something, when we got a steam iron, well, I was the queen of the ironing board! The whoosh of the steam coming out – I loved it! I know, I am weird.

This particular Saturday, I was lost in my thoughts when I heard something that brought me back to reality. It sounded like it was coming from our den. I couldn’t figure it out. I knew I was the only one in that part of the house. Because I am a big ol’ fat chicken, it scared me. I finally got the courage to tiptoe to the den and peek my head around the door, and I didn’t see anything! 

I stood there for a moment, and I heard it again! Thump, thump, thump (it may as well been saying Fee- Fi-Fo- Fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman!). It sounded like it was coming out of the wall. So I carefully positioned myself in the doorway to see what it was. I had the hot iron in my hand and was ready to blast someone with that steam if they came near me. Not thinking that since it was unplugged, there was no steam! I listened closely, the thumping had stopped, so I went back to the ironing board. 

I heard it again a few minutes later, only louder and more intense. THUMP, THUMP, THUMP! Then I heard what sounded like wings hitting against the wall. I was terrified. Of course, in my mind, it was some kind of pterodactyl coming to eat us all and not even leave bones for identification! 

I kept staring at the fireplace because that is where it seemed to be centered. Without thinking, I had moved closer and closer to the fireplace, trying to figure out what the noise was. I realized where I was when I saw movement in the fireplace right above where the wood would have gone.

I screamed like a banshee (in Irish legend – a female spirit whose wailing warns of an impending death in a house). When I screamed extremely shrill and loud, my oldest two sisters came running into the room from upstairs. By the time they got there, the thumping was quite intense, and then we heard a sound – not sure how to explain it. We couldn’t run, we couldn’t move because we all had in our minds that this “thing” was coming for us! 

As we stared into the fireplace, all of a sudden, something came swooping out! Flying over our heads, and went right behind us. Ummmmm…..no! 

We all started running. Well, you can imagine how that went! We were all going separate ways, screaming, and kept running into each other. It had to have looked like a moment from the three stooges! We all pushed around on each other until we were finally all heading in the same direction. 

We all ran into the back of the house to the back room. I slammed the door. Satisfied that I had the situation under control, I relaxed a little. Then all of us started laughing…until…we heard a sound. It sounded like a knock on the door, but it didn’t sound like a human was knocking. It was an odd sound. I froze. We were all just staring at the door like being caught in a horrible horror movie. I looked down and saw something trying to get under the door. I pointed, and again, we all started screaming. We ended up in a huddle on the floor. 

We kept staring at the door. Something was making its way under the door. It was flat like a piece of paper. I was curious and couldn’t take my eyes off of it. All of a sudden, the thing got in. 

IT WAS A BAT! It had flattened itself out and got under the door and came into the room where we were. Well, the room was small, the door was closed, and we were in the corner woven together like a cable knit sweater! We just all tucked our heads and screamed and screamed. 

My mom had been in her beauty shop (the same one that made me “rich” from my performances) and just so happened at that precise moment, came into the house for something. She heard all the commotion. She flung open the door, and she saw us, huddled and screaming! I know it was a sight that she never wants to see again. We were screaming, terrified, and crying. We just knew we were going to die. 

You have to picture my mom with hair teased up on her head and high as the heavens (ya know, the higher the hair, the closer to God you are!). As she flung the door open, the bat turned around and swooped past her head. As it did, she thought it got stuck in her hair, so she started doing a little “jig!” I busted out laughing when I realized that she thought the bat was in her hair.

That poor little bat was more than happy to try to find its way out of our house.

Long dresses and long hair were flying everywhere as we ran and screamed. We probably scared that little bat way more than he scared us! We were just more dramatic! 

WHAT’S ON MY MIND?  GLAD YOU ASKED

My dad used to tell me that I was not an island to myself. Well, he wasn’t in my head! I would go places that would make me smile. Maybe think about a friend and a conversation we had. Something that happened that was hilarious. I still do that!

We can just be living our lives, and then, out of nowhere, something gets our attention! These are times in our lives that we are just going right along, minding our own business and not really paying attention to our surroundings.

We forget what we were doing and what we were thinking and give that “thing” attention. That “thing” can come in many forms. Anything to distract us away from our real purpose in life. Our real purpose is we were made “by Him and for Him.” We are to live out God’s purpose in our lives, not our own.

Colossians 1:16

For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.

The devil knows that your spiritual life will suffer if he can distract you. Your soul will suffer. The ones that God has in your life that you are to reach, they will suffer, and the list goes on. It is a domino effect. Look what he thought he would cause Job to do. The devil thought that Job would curse God and die. But Job fooled him! He knew God would take care of him. He ended up better than when he started! (read the story Job 1:6-22)

Job 1:11

…stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.”

Let’s walk through two distractions that can be in our lives:

Hurt: I have been there. Hurt will keep you distracted for as long as you let it. Hurt will call you. It will “thump, thump, thump” on your heart. It will squeeze its way in and keep you in a corner, cowering in fear. Fear of more rejection. Fear of what someone else may do to you. 

I have made statements like, “it was my fault they hurt me. I let them in my life. I should have known better.” Comments like that keep us in a back room, thinking we are away from the hurt, but it finds us. It slithers in, and we jump and scream, but it keeps coming toward us. Find that person in your life that will check on you. The person who will open the door and ask you what is going on in your life. That person would be a prayer warrior, an intercessor that will pray until you are released from the hurt. It doesn’t matter who rejects you, YOU WERE MADE BY HIM AND FOR HIM, not other people. 

Bitterness: Bitterness is a nasty distraction. It gathers as many people around it as it can get. It is confusing. It will have us running in every direction. We are so confused that we keep running into the same thing repeatedly. It may start with one person, and then we find ourselves letting it spill over into every relationship we have. 

Bitterness is scary, that unknown “thing” that maybe we cannot even put our finger on. We just know at the mention of a person’s name, we become angry, spiteful, spewing hateful things. It comes flying at us, and it tries to get into every room in our hearts. Once it is there, it will suck the life out of you! 

There was a time a few years ago I found myself bitter, angry, and not the person I should have been. I blamed those feelings on a person. A person I thought should have done this or that, and they didn’t. A person that I used to have a good relationship with before life things happened. 

One day at the church office, Jay and I were talking. This person’s name came up, and I exploded. I felt angry…really angry at the mention of their name. Jay, who is one of the people in my that I give permission to speak freely into my life no matter how much it hurts, said something like, “Wendy, if you do not deal with this, you are going to end up a bitter person that no one wants to be around.” Well, I didn’t like that at all. 

See, bitterness wants you to have people around you that will take your side. They will attend the pity parties that you have and bring presents. Presents like gossip about that person or fuels the bitterness inside you, and it explodes. Thankfully I have accountability people in my life that will drag me out of the party and “sober me up” with what the Lord says about things. It isn’t much of a party if no one is attending. 

I want to share an experience I had. Around the time this bitterness and hurt took control of my life, I was in worship one Sunday. I was on my knees. I had a vision of two hands holding a heart and giving it to me like a gift. I knew that the hands were Jesus’ hands. As He handed me this heart, I looked closely at it. I thought it had little tiny pinholes in it. They looked like black holes to me. I was crying and told God. Yes, this person has done this to me. They have punctured my heart. Jesus, help me heal.

I heard a voice tell me to take a closer look. Jesus brought it to me, close where I could clearly see it. It wasn’t pinholes. It was tiny black marks. Like an extra fine sharpie had been used to cover my heart with a black marker.

Again I wasn’t getting what He was showing me. Again, I said that He knew this person did this to my heart, which is why I was having a hard time. He said, “No, they did not do this to your heart; you did. I am holding the blackened heart you have presented to me in your worship.”

I started crying uncontrollably. I felt the pain I had caused my Jesus as I came before Him with sin. A sin that had tainted my heart. I felt like I was the only one in the room as I asked Jesus to forgive me. To wash my heart clean. I made myself a promise that I would take better care of it. It took about an hour of me and Jesus having a conversation that forever changed my heart.

Now, when that “sharpie marker” (bitterness and/or hurt) comes toward me to taint my heart again, I remember the hurt I caused the Lord by presenting Him a heart that was blackened by sin. I do not ever want to do that to my precious Jesus again.

I left that day free. Freer than I had been in years! Jesus set me free. I decide to stay free or to go back to the “thing” that tore my life up. I let it slither under the door of my heart. No more. I am His and He is mine!

As we ready ourselves to pray. Ask God to show you any distraction (sin) in your life. It could be material things, putting your family and friends before God, it could ignoring God’s Word so we can do what we want and not feel guilty. As you are reflecting, listen to this song.

Let’s Pray (use your own words)

Father,

I come before you with an humble heart. Please show me any sin in my life that is keeping me from You. Show me the marks on my heart that I have caused with my sins. I am sorry for presenting a blackened heart to You. I know You cannot accept my worship if I have sin in my life.

Cleanse me Oh Lord, wash me clean. In Isaiah You said that though (y)our sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;

Wash me white, pure so I can stand before You in worship and You can receive my worship in its purity. When sin comes to defile my heart, Lord, call me out, tell me to stop looking at distractions and look at my heart!

I love You Lord! Thank You for accepting me as I worship You in Your presence!

Amen