What is Your Delilah?

One thing becoming glaringly clear to me over the past 20+ years is that I have more than one Delilah. What is a Delilah? It is the thing we run to for comfort and escape, the things that “own” our emotions until we feel better.

Since I was a kid, my escape was day dreaming wonderful stories. When I wasn’t day dreaming, I was watching I Dream of Jeannie or That Girl. Ok, I just dated myself; but you get my point, right? Now, I have discovered the beauty of Netflix. It is always there for me. It always has the right thing to say and makes me feel better. My other escape is sugar and carbs. The combination of Netflix, potato chips and ice cream is a virtual comfort coma.

During the decades of stale grief and painful seasons, I managed to back myself into a cocoon of comfort that brought physical, mental and creative lethargy with fluffy puffiness (that would be the sugar and carbs). It was easy to see what my sugar/carb addiction was doing to me, but it wasn’t as obvious what was happening to my soul.

One day I stopped writing. Another day I stopped day dreaming. Then I stopped challenging myself mentally to read quality books. I stopped living and started surviving.

Eventually, I stopped praying.

Netflix, sugar and carbs became my worship, prayer, and Bible reading. Binge-watching shows became my go-to for problem solving. Sugar became my dopamine. Chips became a vegetable. (I’m still holding on to the last one…potatoes ARE a vegetable. Baby steps, Dana. Baby steps.)

Basically, I’d given my wounds over to my Delilah and I was suffocating. My creative voice was silenced and my back-side was growing.

As I climb out of the stale grief and allow the Lord to replace Delilah, my gifts are yawning and stretching like a cat unfurling from an afternoon nap in the sun. The suffocation of merely surviving left me gasping in my soul crying out “I want to live!” It has taken seasons of fasting and prayer to climb out of this dark hole. It didn’t just happen. So be encouraged, dear one. And be ignited. The enemy wants nothing more than for us to be unhealthy, distracted, and resting our head in Delilah’s lap.

It’s time to lift the head off Delilah’s lap and walk in our gifting. Living is worth the sacrifice!

I still stay potato chips are a vegetable.