THE WALLS ARE COMING DOWN!

Again, another tough week. Emotional. Constantly hungry. Irritated with the entire world and myself.  The Holy Spirit has had to work overtime to keep me in check, let me tell you.

Have I ever said how thankful I am for His mercy and grace?

I walked into the gym on Tuesday, muttering to myself ‘what in the world are you doing here at 6:30am?? You could be in bed, sleeping. Cuddling with the cat. Doesn’t that sound better?’ I answered myself (wait….does that make me crazy??) with a resounding ‘YES!’, but then reminded myself that I HAVE to do this to progress. I have to keep fighting against my lazy flesh and do the opposite of what it tells me to do. So, I pulled up Spotify, found my prayer playlist and got to work. While fighting through the tiredness and continual inner whining, Michael W. Smith’s song ‘Surrounded’ came on. Immediately, my spirit perked up. ‘This is how I fight my battles…..this is how I fight my battles….’ Over and over, I sang those lines to myself. I asked God to tell me what I needed to hear to get through this funk. Instantly, Joshua and the walls of Jericho flashed through my mind. I saw Joshua and his army gathered together, preparing for the walk around the walls of the city.

Bunny Trail: While preparing to write this blog Thursday night, I pulled up the Equipped 4 More website and almost fell off the couch when I saw the song Julie had posted!! It was the EXACT song I mentioned above. I asked God to confirm that this was what I was to write this week and He did just that!

Joshua 6:2-5 says “then the Lord said to Joshua, ‘See, I have delivered Jericho into your hands, along with its king and its fighting men. March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests carry trumpets of rams horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times, with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have the whole army give a loud shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the army will go up, everyone straight in’.

Thanks to Answers in Genesis, I found some information about the walls of Jericho. It’s about to get technical, but bear with me as share these details. I promise you’ll see why this is important later on.  A great embankment surrounded Jericho with a stone retaining wall at its base. The retaining wall was about 12-15 feet high. On top of that was a mud brick wall about six feet thick and about 20-26 feet high. At the crest of this embankment was a similar mud brick wall whose base was about 46 feet above the ground level outside of that wall.

This is what the Israelites were faced with. Without a miracle, there was no way they were going to get through it.

To me, this journey to health is much like those walls of Jericho. There is NO WAY that we are going to break through the wall of food issues without God’s help. It’s going to require a miracle and our obedience. In the face of insurmountable odds, we’ve got to figure out how to bring those walls down. We know God is the master of working miracles, so this wall, in scripture and the one before us, is nothing more than a kid’s craft project built with popsicle sticks in the eyes of the Lord. I believe God showed me through these scriptures just how to do that.

First, God tells Joshua that He has delivered Jericho into their hands. Believing that takes faith – faith to believe that it’s already done even though you are standing there, staring up at those high, impenetrable walls. You have faith! We have faith! We wouldn’t have joined E4M without believing God was going to do something incredible in our lives! First step – DONE!

Second, God told them to march around the walls of that city once for the first six days, then seven times on the seventh day. I’m sure, as they marched past the behemoth before them day after day, they were thinking, ‘how is this going to bring it down?? This makes no sense!’ What God asked them to do seemed crazy. Can you image what the inhabitants of that city were saying to them as they marched around? I’m sure the insults and ridicule rained down on them nonstop. Yet, they kept on marching. How often does the enemy speak to us the same way? He tells us we will never be victorious, we will never lose weight, we will never be in control. BUT, in spite of whether or not we understand or think that what God is telling us to do is going to work and in spite of what the enemy says, we must obey the instructions of the Lord. Isaiah 55:8-9 reminds us that His thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways are not our ways. They are higher than ours! He sees from an eternal perspective. We see from a temporal one. I firmly believe that God has given Julie insight into the pathways to victory in this journey. God speaks to her, I know it. I’ve seen it manifested in your experiences, my own experience and in her personal walk with Jesus. We need to hear the word of the Lord that she lays out before us and OBEY the instructions God gives. This is key to bringing those walls down.

Finally, God instructed them to carry the Ark of the Covenant with them and to have seven priests blow the seven trumpets as they marched. The ark represents the presence of God. The blowing of the trumpets was a sign that God would remember them in the day of battle. This is where praise comes in this journey. We must ensure that we are inviting the presence of the Lord to join us every step of the way. We must praise the Lord for His goodness, for His Word, for His instruction and remember that He KNOWS what we are doing and that He would remember us in the battle!! As Michael W. Smith tells us in his song, this is how we fight our battles! It may look like we are surrounded, but we are surrounded by Him!

Joshua 6:20 tells us that on the seventh day, as they marched around the seventh time, Joshua instructed them to shout. Can you imagine what that sounded like?? Between the sounds of the army marching, the trumpets blaring and the mighty shout from God’s people, there was no way the wall could stand! It crumbled before them and they immediately went in and took the city.

Do you see yourself with Joshua? Are you marching around those walls of self-doubt? Well, they are about to be destroyed! What about the walls of food being our comfort and idol? Pulverized! The walls of ‘I’m never going to get control’? Eliminated. This is our story! Faith, obedience and praise are how we will win this battle!

 When you feel overwhelmed, much like I have this week, remember Jericho. Believe, march and shout your way to victory in spite of what it looks like or what it feels like! God’s got this and YOU!!

Are you ready for your walls to come down!  Join Kellie and our family of warriors as we learn to cry out to God, and “fight our weight loss battles”  His way!

XOXO KELLIE 🙂