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Chapter 18

"Where Are You?"

My memories of Narda Martinez are full of pity. I do not recall great accomplishments or major victories. All I remembered are failures, misfortunes, many disappointments and a wish that I had never been born. Why should I care about her now? It is twenty odd years later. 

The stripping of each layer is crushing as God began to unfurl the deep places in my life. My heart panted with fear as we began to walk through the corridors of my wounded-heart. I did not want to have another look at the ache of rejection for it was too painful. The revisit of this old, yet familiar place was like pacing through an obscure antechamber. As I approached closer, I could hear the echoes of fury and the bellowing sounds of a weeping child, the unrelenting silence of an unhappy little girl who was abandoned, rejected and left to survive on her own. I was now forced to face my greatest fear— ME!

Everything in me wanted to run and hide. Nothing in me wanted to reflect on the times yore. If I had my own way, I would run far, far away. Oh, that I had wings like a dove, for then I would fly away and be at rest; but then, I would wander off and remain in the wilderness (Psalms 55:6).

But if I was to fulfill my destiny, it was imperative that I die to self and allow the crushing to take place. I had to open the door and allow the Savior to enter my secret place, a place where monumental phantoms had claimed territory. No one had ever entered here, for I had this place barricaded, restricted, and concealed. Only I knew this place existed or so I thought, but the time had come to revisit this forbidden and unwelcoming site.

God’s Vision of the Real Narda Martinez:

As we began the tour, I took a fleeting look into several rooms and saw old familiar dusty pictures and memoirs. I hastily shut the doors and scuttled through the halls not desiring to remain any longer than I needed. I entered the corridors only to pass a shrouded goddess, who cynically hissed and odiously attacked my self-esteem. She cruelly whispered, “Who do you think you really are?” I took a deep breath and with my head held up, I retorted, “A daughter of Zion!”

As I continued across the threshold, my attention was drawn to the disheartening sounds coming from the room way down on the other side of the hallway. As I got closer, just behind the doors, I could hear a child weeping. I did not understand why she had been crying until I peered through the cracked door and saw that she had been at play with her dollhouse. Someone had deliberately and maliciously overthrown her beautifully put together dollhouse. All the pieces had been precisely positioned in their respectable spaces but were now in disarray and scattered all over the room. Who would callously plot to destroy her perfectly designed dollhouse? I left her crying with her arms folded across her chest and feeling sorry for her.

As I entered through another passageway, I came to a room teemed with mirrors. They were all colors, shapes and sizes. Each piece had been skillfully and beautifully handcrafted and each had its own peculiarity. But the mirrors troubled me because I knew they reflected something that I was not ready to face, so I quickly shut the door.

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