A Simple Choice
I began acting in 2010, and I was doing fairly well filling up my resume, but three years later I found myself stalled out. Auditions were not coming in as much, and I was booking less. Frustration settled in because I felt God had opened so many doors and now it seemed like they were being closed. But alas,
Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but the purpose of the Lord will prevail. Proverbs 19:21
One day while sitting at church, I had this vision of a story play out in my head. I left there in tears knowing that it was a story entrusted to me, but I had no idea what to do with it. However, when I went home I wrote down the vision because I knew it was important.
Some time later, I felt God telling me to write a screenplay of the vision and make it into a short film. As an actor, I was very familiar with scripts but I had never written one. So I bought Screenwriting for Dummies and began to make it happen. To make a long story short, I wrote the script, produced the film and got to act in it as well.
It was called, A Simple Choice.
It was about a haggard woman, Sara, who was prostituted at a young age by her mother. Even after her mother was no longer there, she continued that lifestyle, believing that was her lot in life. That she was no longer worthy of a normal life, a blessed life. A caring woman, who herself was sold into sexual slavery when she was young, made it her life mission to free others like herself from a life of condemnation and soul imprisonment. She loved on Sara and tried everything to get her to leave her current situation, but Sara was scared. It wasn’t until she was faced with a life or death situation that she had the courage to change, the courage to make a simple choice.
When I wrote this script, I believed with all of my heart that God could do anything. That He can take someone’s life and make it new again, and we were loved no matter what our past looked like or what we were currently doing.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 1 Corinthians 5:17
He made my life new when I made the choice to give it to Him in 6th grade. He became my Rock, My Stronghold and my Savior. I believed that if I remained connected to Him, walked the righteous path and obeyed, I was set for life until the day I walked through those pearly gates.
Unbeknownst to me, as I stood looking out a picture window, choosing to give my life to Christ, that there would come a day when I would have to make another choice. A choice that eluded me for years, whether by denial, complacency or ignorance. Or, maybe it just wasn’t God’s timing.
That choice is something we all will face at some time in our walk with God. You see, when we become a new creation, our sins are forgiven and we are given the gift of the Holy Spirit, our guide in this life. It doesn’t mean that all of our past hurts, inner vows and bad habits just disappear, and if we don’t do anything with them, we go through life continually asking God to forgive us for things we keep doing wrong, without taking the time and insight to ask ourselves, WHY?
I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. Romans 7:19
At some point in our spiritual journey, we will hit what Peter Scazzero in Emotionally Healthy Spirituality calls “the Wall – or, as the ancients called it, “the dark night of the soul.” It is a moment in our life where we feel stuck, unsure, frustrated, broken, or at the bottom of a dark pit. It could also be a moment in our life where it feels like we are being taken into the fire by life’s circumstances. Regardless of the reason we have hit the wall, we stand there in front of it and must make a choice. We either ignore it or deal with it on our own strength. Or we make a choice to allow God to work on us. To search our innermost being. To heal us from the inside out. To change and build our character.
My moment of choice came in my bathroom.
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Having gone through difficult circumstances in my young life, I had built up a self-protective wall around my heart. I could easily control what I would or would not let penetrate my heart. It was so subtle that I wasn’t even aware of how much control I tried to exert onto my life circumstances and surroundings.
That day in my bathroom God opened my eyes and revealed to me that I still didn’t fully trust Him. That I was still trying to control my situation, and He wanted me to let go so that He could take the lead on my journey.
“But God, I’m already broken. You want to take me even deeper into my brokenness?”
God had already shown me how much he loved me. How much I mattered to him. I just needed to let go of the control and completely trust in the Lord who I gave my life to decades ago. I needed to let go.
I made a simple choice in that moment by saying two words.
“I surrender.”
I laid there on my floor faced down in complete surrender, giving Him the control. I wish I could say it’s been easy ever since, but I can’t. I daily have to surrender my control over to Him. But it all started with a choice to surrender my life to Him and to allow Him to take me on this journey of transformation.
A journey of self-examination (Lamentations 3:40).
A journey of cleaning out the inside of the cup (Matthew 23:26).
A journey of healing (Psalm 147:3)
A journey through the wall, or as I see it…through the fire. (Romans 5:6)
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Before I write a blog, I usually have thoughts and ideas running through my head, but I always seek what God wants me to say. Sometimes, unfortunately, He likes to wake me up and tell me in the middle of the night when I’m asleep. One of those times, my film came to mind, but I wasn’t sure why I would use it in this particular blog, but I felt God wanting me to use it. Days go by as thoughts continue to swirl in my head and it wasn’t until I was on my way home to begin putting thoughts to paper, that God impressed this on my heart.
We are all like Sara, in my film. We may not be a prostitute but we all have a story. My friend Heather Layne, wrote a song for my film called Courage to Change. In it she wrote,
You don’t know me,
Don’t you judge me,
’cause you can’t see inside of me.
We all have a story
Pain to Glory
We all feel humanity.
You came along
Singing my song
I’m starting to see a brand new me,
Free from these chains
And courage to change.
Our story plays out like Sara’s. We let our past hurts and habits define who we are and dictate how we relate to others, and we claim it as our lot in life.
This is just what I know.
This is how it has always been.
But have you ever thought…that even no matter how great we think our lives are right now, that maybe God sees something even better and He wants to give it to you?
It just takes a simple choice and two words to begin your journey of freedom and of broken chains…
I surrender.
Make sure you subscribe so you won’t miss out on next week’s blog, “The Fire.” Why we may choose not to go through our Refiner’s fire.
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