Breaking Down to Rebuild: Part 1 - The Remodel

anxiety better living family stress work Oct 23, 2021

7 minute read

By Bethany Rees

The Remodel

Have you ever remodeled a room in your house?

The TV shows portray such an eloquent process in remodeling, but the real life experience is quite different. The process is quite messy and can be very daunting. First you have to figure out why a remodel needs to happen. Is the room no longer functional to meet your needs? Is the design just completely outdated and in need of a face-lift?

Second, you have to count the cost of the remodel. You have big dreams of amazing designs with the latest and greatest of home decor and technology. You design the most amazing room only to have your hopes and dreams dashed by sticker shock at the price of the remodel.

So you regroup and head to the third part of the process: analyzing what really needs to be replaced and what can be salvaged. Are there some good structural bones and items that can be kept and used so as to save time, money, and heartache?

Fourth you have to rip out the old to make room for the new. This is the messiest of experiences and often takes the most sweat equity of the entire project. It takes great force to rip out old cabinets and bust up heavily cemented, glued, or tacked floors. Then with great precision, you have to tear down walls without causing other structural damage to load bearing walls, pipes, or electrical cords.

The dust alone from that one remodeled room will spread and cover items in several other areas of your home. You didn’t realize how the tearing down of one space would affect all the other areas of your house too. You can’t believe the pile of trash you have created and how much it costs to haul it away. After completion of the demolition, you stand back in disbelief. What once was a livable space now looks like a natural disaster area in need of the National Guard and FEMA.

Finally after days of demolition, the work begins on building the new functional and beautiful space. You carefully install and lay down new elements to make sure everything looks and functions as it is supposed to in the new design.

Skipping ahead to the big reveal moment, you stand in awe of the beauty of the new room. You have designed it for a purpose and here you are getting to admire and utilize your new room for what you had intended. The cost was worth it.

Our Personal Remodeling

Have you ever gone through a tough experience only to realize at a later date that the experience was needed to help you in a new situation later or God used your experience to help someone else going through the same situation? If so, you my friend have been remodeled by our Perfect God.

For example, you begrudgingly learned one skill in job A (e.g. how to mediate conflict with peers or speak in front of a small peer group) only to depend on that skill in job B (e.g. how to mediate conflict between your employees or give presentations to major stakeholders).

OR

You went through a really tough time in your marriage where it felt like your world was ending only to be carried through it by God. And now God has placed another person in your life going through a similar situation and you are able to help them find hope, stability, and support in the same God that carried you through.

Just like we remodel rooms in our homes, oftentimes we experience a time of remodeling or rebuilding personally. It could be in our room of faith, identity, relationships, pride, addiction, or something else.

Just like rooms can be remodeled due to function or outdated design decor, sometimes we are being remodeled for the same reasons.

Yes, I’m using an extended metaphor here so I hope it is coming across.

There are times in your life when you may feel like everything you’ve been used to and comfortable with is being ripped out and demolished.

That wood floor of youth and energy has become a mismatch of old haggard wood planks that are scratched, chipped, damaged, and dull from years of hard living. They are being stripped down and repolished to shine like new.

That pipe of unstable emotions that keeps leaking anxiety and has caused toxic mold to grow in your mind and home is being replaced with a new mindset.

That creature of habit on the floor that’s been tripping you up for years is now being jack-hammered and broken to pieces so its stronghold on you will be no more.

That hidden addiction behind your walls is being exposed so it’s secret desire can be completely removed.

It is a painful process and at times you feel like you have been gutted with nothing left to give. The dust, pain, and suffering from your personal remodel in one area of your life can carry over and affect others. The demolition process is creating such a mess in your life, you come to a point of saying “I just can’t even…”

In your time of stress, pain, suffering, or burnout have you stopped to think about how God might be rebuilding you in a way you’ve never known for a purpose you never thought possible?

God is the creator of all things and no one knows you better than He. And sometimes we, just like the rooms in our houses, can experience a remodel as God works all of our situations for good.

Sometimes we need to be pruned of the sin holding us back and sometimes we need to be updated with skills and experiences to help us in a new environment or season of life. Stop and ask yourself if you are getting remodeled by or becoming a new creation in God.

...BUT GOD

So when you are going through a difficult time where you are burned out, burnt up, and feel like a pile of ashes, remember there is always a BUT GOD moment…

Below are statements of truth from scripture to help you through your time of pain, suffering, and/or rebuilding. Read them. Pray them. Write them. Memorize them. Remind yourself of them daily as you are being remodeled.

So now go! Seek Him! Find Him! Lay prostrate before Him! Ask Him to reveal His work in you!

But God knows your pain, your grief, your thoughts, your fears...

“You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. ~ Psalm 139:1-5

But God loves you no matter your circumstance or sin…

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” ~ 1 John 4:9-10

But God will be your strength, refuge, shelter, and comfort in all situations…

“Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” ~ Deuteronomy 31:6

“Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” ~ Psalm 23:4

But God will grow your faith in and your relationship with Him...

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” ~ John 16:33

“More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” ~ Romans 5:3-5

“because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. ~ James 1:3-4

“I can do all this through him who gives me strength.” ~ Philippians 4:13

But God will use your circumstance for good...

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” ~ Romans 8:28

“And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.” ~ 1 Peter 5:10

But God will use you for His purpose and His kingdom to produce more fruit…

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” ~ John 15:1-3

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” ~ Galatians 5:22-23

“For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.” ~ Ephesians 5:8-11

My Story

In next week’s blog, part 2, I will share my remodeling experience as well as excerpts from my prayer journal that shows the absolute pain and desperation I was in during the demolition phase and the beautiful transformation that happened in me as God continued to replace my old self with His new creation.

Know Better. Do Better. Live Better. Be Rebuilt.

Rocks before Sand!

Scripture:

“because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

~ James 1:3-4 NIV

Theme Songs:

Truth Be Told by Matthew West

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0Sqb95vsIM

My Jesus by Anne Wilson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWLm6z42Gk8

Reference Used:

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