Strong, Brave, Loved by Holley GerthÀpẹrẹ

Day Two

Running Toward Grace

Scripture: Zechariah 4:6

I’m driving home from lunch with a new friend, replaying the conversation in my mind. Fear makes my breathing shallow, my heartbeat fast. What if she doesn’t like me? What if I came across all wrong? I often have moments like this when anxiety gets the best of me.

But this time I pray, “Jesus, help me. I don’t understand why I act this way. I want to be free.” A simple declaration comes to my heart: I am done running away. From now on, I am running toward. 

I don’t even fully understand what this means, but I put on my tennis shoes and go for a run when I get home. I think of all I have run away from . . . how fear has chased me and people-pleasing has set my pace, how anxiety has nipped at my heels, how the lies have worn me out. 

I am done. 

I will no longer be a woman who’s defined by what she’s running from. 

In the past, the strategy I’ve usually decided on in moments like these can be summed up in six words: be good, do more, try harder. But this strategy has been failing me. I think of a recent evening when I went to bed feeling worn and weary. Sometime past midnight, I woke up in the dark and the words of Zechariah 4:6 came to my heart. 

I’d been worried because I thought the battle was completely up to me. And all the while I had the Lord of heaven’s armies willing to fight on my behalf. We are beloved daughters of God. We are more than conquerors. Nothing is too difficult for us because nothing is impossible for the God within us.

I speak these truths to my own soul with each step I take. I also declare this: I am going to run toward grace. I am going to run toward love. I am going to run toward boldness and freedom and holy confidence. I am going to run toward Jesus. I don’t know everything this new perspective means, what exactly I have done, but it feels like something dark and destructive challenged me to a race today. 

And I won. 

God, You are the One who gives us the courage to stop running away and instead run toward all You have for us. Be our strength in every step today. Amen.