Have you ever stepped on a thumbtack?
I was working away this morning trying to get things ready for the contractors to come and paint. I ran into my oldest daughter’s room to make sure she had moved everything around to allow them excess to the walls. I stepped between her dresser and the bed and low and behold I was hit with great pain in my right foot. I had encountered a stray thumbtack. I removed the thumbtack with great deal of pain and effort. Breathing deeply as I quickly pulled it out of my foot. I proceeded on to the housework. Limping a bit but eventually surviving the obstacle.
Isn’t it amazing how something so small can cause such pain?
When I was finished I sat down with nice hot cup of tea. I came to think on how much that thumbtack in my foot this morning was much like our lives. We come across incidents where someone says or does something to us and it hurts us, just like that thumbtack in my foot. When we try and remove it from our lives. It hurts to remove it but in time the pain does subside in a few days sometimes sooner. However we never forget the incident. We remember the pain.
I was a victim of bulling as a child. I was told by many that I would never amount to anything. I was fat. I was ugly I smelled. I was stupid. They would make fun of me because I did not have the best clothes. I would never fit in. I had no friends at school. If I had a friend it was because they only wanted to get close enough to make me the brunt of their unkind jokes. I would let them in and they would crush me in any way they could. In time I built up walls so no one could hurt me. I was going to let that thumbtack in my life hurt me ever again. When I got older I learned to trust, however I always had that wall there. It put insecurities and doubts into my life. People would say things playing or kidding and I never seemed to see it as a joke. To me they were attacking me. I also found it hard to trust even God because everyone else hurt my why would he be any different. It was hard for me to see a relationship with God because every relationship or person I had met failed me or hurt me. I discovered in life that even as an adult you had bullies.
In time as I grew I actually felt sorry for these people because I realized that these people where the way they were because they too had low self esteem. They made me and those around them look bad to boost their egos. I was sad for them to think that someone would have so little esteem that they would have to make those around them look good. However the pain still remained. Once something is said or done to a person it will never be the same. Too many times we do things without thinking on the consequences. I see things so much differently since I because a believer in God. I see things through his eyes. I am not bitter towards those who hurt me. I do not wish anyone harm. With that thumbtack in my life it still makes my walk a hard one. Once the tack is in your foot you are not able to walk the same. When the tack is removed you can walk again however that memory is in the back of your mind forever.
God takes our lives and he helps us pull the tacks out. He also helps us to heal. With him I can see things differently. I can also forgive those that have hurt me. So many people walk around with grudges and bitterness because of that thumbtack that still sits in their foot. If they would only pull that thumbtack out and allow it to heal.
Do you have a thumbtack in your foot? Maybe it is time to pull it out. And if you can’t do it alone reach out. Once that thumbtack it removed you will be amazed at the difference it will make in your life.
The choice is yours to make.....
Do you remove that obsticle so you can walk again? Or do you walk on it forever?
