An Empty Room
This image may just look like an empty room to you. But to me it holds lots of meaning and memories.
This was the room I prepared as I waited for my new-born baby to arrive. This is the room I spent night after night feeding and caring for my baby. This is the room where my new-born baby grew into a toddler and would call out to me when he had woken up.
To anyone else, this just looks like an empty, common room. But to me it is filled with love and cherished moments.
As part of our renovation we have had to move our son out so that this room can become a bathroom. And it almost breaks my heart as I feel like I’m truly saying goodbye to my new-born baby and moving into the toddler stage of parenting.
We never truly know what attachment other people have to something. I didn’t even realise how much attachment I had to my nursery until it was stripped bare.
Often people struggle to change because of an attachment they have. We find this a great deal in churches. People don’t like to move seats because they feel familiar in their set seats. People don’t like to change the structure otherwise they miss knowing what is to come.People don’t like to change the building because they were married there or got baptised there or had a funeral there.
All these things are important and meaningful. But we need to be careful that we don’t live in the past and hold on too tightly to what has been.
I can’t hold too tightly to my baby because he needs to grow up and develop. So too does our faith, our family, our relationships and our churches.
Remembering the past is important but we mustn’t hold so tightly to what has been that we don’t move confidently into the future.
Lord, You have allowed us to recognise the past, particularly through the scriptures. But Your Word is there to remind us of Your faithfulness, not to make us return to what has been. Give us the confidence to move into the future, knowing You are there preparing the way. Amen.
What, from your past, do you need to loosen your grip on?
This article was written by Linda Bailey
Linda started theological studies in 1999 in Australia. After working for ten years in various church ministries, she now works as the breakfast producer at 89.9 LightFM - the Christian radio station in Melbourne, Australia. She writes blogs every day about passages she is currently reading in the Bible. Follow her on Google Plus +Linda Bailey or Facebook by clicking the like button on the right of this page.
1 comment:
Linda,
‘An empty room’, I loved this devotional. Mine isn’t an empty room, but a empty house. A house I lived in for 50 years. A house I moved into when I was 7 months pregnant with my son and brought my daughter home to two years later and raised them both there until they left and moved on to their own lives and now have families of their own. Just recently (Just 3 short months ago) my husband and I moved from that house that stands empty now. We bought a new home out in the country. I miss my old home. I am having a hard time adjusting to the new place. Still a lot of unpacking to do and finding a place for it. I get so home sick for it, I sit and cry when I am by myself. But the move was necessary due to my husband having Parkinson’s and it was hard for him to go up and down stairs. The new place is one floor. A double wide modular home. But all my memories are in that old 2 story house I lived in for 50 years.
So reading this devotional taught me I need to let go and live where I am with my husband where it is easier for him to get around. He isn’t bedridden, but he does spend most of his time in bed or in a recliner. So I need to move confidently into the future.
Thanks for sharing your feelings of ‘An empty room’ with us all.
Have faith In Him,
Faye