What’s it like living in a box? There are days and moments when I live in a box.
Before I get emails expressing concern about receiving mail at the address my cardboard box resides, this box is not a physical one, but a mental one.
This box is where people categorize me. Sometimes it’s where I feel the safest classifying myself.
Living in this categorized world where, yes, I stay safe, but it’s not where I can become the person God has created me to be. Nor can you become the person God has designed you to be.
We need to break the box!
There is a favorite saying right now, where change only happens outside of our comfort zone.
There is the one simple fact; change is uncomfortable. For us and those around us.
Whether we know it or not, God has called us to be different. To be set apart.
Whether we know it or not, God has called us to be different. To be set apart. Share on XDo you feel out of place at times? Or hemmed in by the expectations of those closest to us?
I struggle with the awkward moment when it feels as if I don’t fit in my own skin. What people expect of me or are telling me isn’t what lines up with the person God says I am.
I know deep in the hidden places of my heart where I fear to go because it might see the light of day, I’m created for something different than the box others have put me. More accurately, the box I’ve allowed others to put me in.
In Acts 5:29 (NLT), it says,”But Peter and the apostles replied, ‘We must obey God rather than any human authority.’”
If I break out of this box, what will people think of me? The bigger question is, if I don’t break out of this box, what will God think of me?
David, the great king in the Old Testament, felt this way too. Before he defeated Goliath, the reigning king, Saul, attempted putting his armor on David to protect him as he fought the Palestinian giant, Goliath.
As David moved around in the armor, testing it out, he knew it wasn’t right for him. I envision David swinging his arms, maybe jogging in place and gently pulling at the collar of this foreign object covering him. David knew he couldn’t perform his best-wearing something which didn’t suit him.
In 1 Samuel 17: 38-39 (NLT), it says, “Then Saul gave David his own armor—a bronze helmet and a coat of mail. 39 David put it on, strapped the sword over it, and took a step or two to see what it was like, for he had never worn such things before. ‘I can’t go in these,’ he protested to Saul. ‘I’m not used to them.’ So David took them off again.”
Instead of pleasing King Saul, or worse, making him angry, David was merely honest and knew the armor didn’t fit into the plan God had for him.
We can get into the same trap. We try on different personalities or clothes or relationships, to see what fits the expectation of those around us. Instead, God wants us to wear what He has perfectly created for us.
In Matthew 6: 28-29 it says, “And why worry about your clothing? Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are.”
God crafts the beauty of a lily, which here today and gone tomorrow, imagine how much more He is ready to provide a life designed perfectly just for us if we stay present with Him.
Notice I didn’t say our life would look perfect. The perfect live God gives us includes hardships and trials to grow our dependence on Him.
No one else can do what God has called us to do. We each have a unique voice which the dark places of the world are begging to hear because they need you to break out of your box.
Are you living in a box? How do you plan to break out of it? Share your strategies in the comments below to help others.