I remember the day the winds came. “Billy died,” my mom said with a weight that sank down deep in my gut. That’s when the rain began to storm and the sky began to blacken and my heart began to plunge.

I had been wanting to make amends with him, this man who had given me life. Forgive, I’d hear Christ beckon at my heart. But the hurt was too potent. Because I thought about him a lot, this stranger who shared my name. I often wondered who he was and where he was and how he was. But mostly, I wondered why he left, why holding onto the drugs was better than holding onto his daughter.

And in some ways, the hurt he left in his wake felt comfortable. I was used to it and so I rested in it. Year after year I’d hide deeper in the safety of the fortress I had built for myself, only emerging for short pleasantries or halfhearted conversations with him. All the while, Christ tapped on my door. Forgive, He’d whisper through the cracks in the walls of my heart.

Those walls crumbled the day my father died. The winds blew, the rain fell, the floods came, and everything collapsed into ruin. It is one of the deepest regrets I hold, knowing that things could have ended differently had I built my castle on faith of what He was leading me to. (See Matthew 7:24-27.)

But this isn’t a story about forgiveness or past mistakes. This is a story about all of the ways God is tapping at the walls of your heart and all of the ways you’re ignoring Him. It is a story about learning to walk in faith even when it feels uncomfortable or vulnerable or scary. It is a story about a castle built upon a rock. It is your story.

Let Him be your foundation, and He will protect you from the storm.

[bctt tweet="It is your story. // @iambritcal" username="blessedisshe__"]

Pray again the antiphon for today: Seek the LORD while he may be found; call him while he is near (Isaiah 55:6).

Brittany Calavitta is an enthusiastic advocate for a good book, strong coffee, and a hopeful heart. After battling years of infertility, she and her husband welcomed their first child on September 11, 2016. You can find out more about her here.