The Story that took me 18 years to write…
I began writing this story when I was going through a season of deep heart ache; however, it took me 18 years to write to completion, which is why my English sometimes jumps back and forth between past and present tense and why my writing style changes throughout. Each time I picked it up to write it, I was writing from a completely different perspective.
It didn’t just take me 18 years to write this story. It took me 18 years learn this story.
I started out with a wide-eyed wonder. Curiosity and “goodwill to all” was once the lens with which I saw the world through. But like a child who puts it’s hand to the flame, it’s not before long that I quickly learn that not all those we call “friends” are kind.
With a wounded heart, and broken trust, I pushed away any threat of pain. My friend quickly became my foe with the slightest offense. “Fool me once, and only once,” I said.
I dreamed of a castle, with lofty walls, doors of strength and locks of great power. I knew each brick and stone must be built by the offense of another. Wound and wrongs, insults and injuries; the more that came, the bigger my castle would be.
I closed the door, and destroyed the key.
It was only then that I realized too little too late, that I had not built a castle, but a cage.
The darkness surrounds me and pours into my soul. The silence screams at me, and the loneliness is more than I can bear. Like a trapped animal, I searched for a way of escape. The harder I try, the greater my panic, until I am clawing and wailing at the door like a pitiful creature doomed to death.
I now am a captive, a prisoner of my own prison. I am tormented with what if’s. My mistakes and regrets haunt me. An offense here, and offense there- did they really seem so great after all? Apparently so, because now each one has enslaved me.
Who can reach me in this prison I’ve built? Who will save me now? I ask myself, even knowing the impossible. To break through the walls of my prison walls, not one soul can. Even if God himself exists, he could not possibly breach through the layers of defenses, defiance and resentment that I have built.
I can see nothing. I can hear nothing. In agony I lay my head down for the last time. All hope is gone. My fortress, my prison.
In hopelessness, I barely breath the words, “God, if you exist… find me…” My voice trails off.
Suddenly piercing the darkness like a sword in the silence, I hear a voice. “Here I am.” There is no need for an explanation. I know who it is. One could not mistake the sound of this voice.
So God does exist.
I can now hear the sound of my own heart beat. Fear grips me, following by waves and waves of shame. I can barely gather the courage to speak. When I do, my voice shakes, and I do not even look up.
“What… are you going to do to me?”
I hold my breath, waiting for the answer of the ultimate punishment, one far worse than the one I have already built for myself.
Instead, there is silence. This silence seems almost more tormenting than the answer I am expecting; the punishment I deserve.
I am still afraid to look up at him.
“Please, just get it over with!” My heart screams with my eyes tightly shut. “End it all now!” My body trembles with dread.
Something wet runs down my face. It does not take me more than a moment to realize they are tears. But they are not MY tears; my shame is too great for tears.
My curiosity fights my trepidation. Ever so cautiously, ever so slowly, I open my eyes. I am not certain what I expect to see in the darkest of darkness. I have created my prison with no light.
They are his tears.
And the impossible seems to have happened; every tear that falls shatters the darkness around it with light. Like raindrops that fall on a thirsty desert, one by one, his tears light the darkness around us. In the darkness I can see his face.
Our eyes lock and time stands still.
Then, more shocking, more surprising than anything else that had happened, his arms surrounded me and from the very depth of His being, with all that He was, He wept.
If he really knew me- the REAL me, he would not dare to be here.
I don’t understand. Why would someone like him love someone like me?
Doesn’t he know that I built this prison that has us both here?
An eternity passes.
Doesn’t he know all I’ve done?
His voice breaks my thoughts. “Yes, I know.”
As hard as I try, nothing is hidden from him.
He continues, “I have watched you consume yourself with your prison. I have watched as day after day, you worked earnestly to see it built. You carefully watched over it, until it was finished, only to find that you built yourself into it. You longed for isolation only to have it destroy you. I watched as you were tormented with regrets, and a broken heart. I have watched all these things. I have watched and I have heard you call out to me. And I am here. When you call out to me, I am here, no matter where you are.”
“Don’t you know these walls are unbreakable? Once you are in, you can NEVER escape!”
“Will you trust me?” He asks. It was more than just a question.
Could I trust him?
I thought of his faithfulness in my agony, when I cried out for help. “I don’t understand everything, but I want to trust you. I want to trust my life to you. Will you love me?”
He smiled. “I already do. I couldn’t possibly love you more. Will you trust me?”
“Yes.”
“Then you must destroy every single stone and brick you’ve built. One by one by one.”
A gut-wrenching pain pierced my soul. “I can’t do it! It hurts too much!”
He cupped his hand around my face like a caring father and looked me in the eyes. “Not if you give them to me.”
So this is what it meant to trust Him.
I went to the biggest brick I could find, and tried to lift it. The weight was overwhelming, and impossible. I grunted, and strained, and struggled with every ounce of my being.
“I can’t!” I cried.
He looked at me with such love. “You are trying to pick up the weight of that brick with all the other bricks on top of it. Do not try to start with the biggest bricks. Try a smaller one, and let your soul build up the strength.”
With bitter tears in my eyes, I looked for the smallest brick I could find. I picked it up. I looked down at the offense written on it. It seemed so small and insignificant now. Did that really offend me? It was so small that I tried to tear it to pieces myself. As hard as I tried, it was as though it was forged with unbreakable steel. And the pain that it caused me was almost unbearable. “God!” I screamed. “Help me!”
“Give it to me.”
With a defeated heart, I placed the “insignificant” brick in his hands. It was like nothing for him. It crumbled in his hands like powder.
It was then that I felt something new nudge my soul.
Dare I even say what…?
I felt what I thought was a twinge of hope.
Quickly, I ran to the next brick, picked it up, and handed it to him. Again, it crumbled into dust in his hands. Tears of relief rolled down my face, as I sprinted for the next stone, and the next and the next. There he began the tedious task of taking apart, piece by piece the prison that I had so carefully built up. He worked continually, tearing apart every brick and stone I handed him, every offense I ever created. Every piece I give him is bigger than the last, and yet, this time I am able to carry each one into his hands. It is as though I become stronger with each piece that I give up into his hands.
The work is difficult and exhausting, yet, he does not stop. I am astonished by his determination to finish. We keep working together as a team. I hand him my bricks and stones, as he, the God of the universe, dissolves my offenses, my hate and my walls. Piece by piece by piece; my prison of isolation slowly vanishing before my very eyes.
We can nearly see the light of day. The sun is beginning to peek through the cracks of my prison walls. Anticipation fills my heart. I can barely believe it. I thought I would never be free!
Unexpectedly, I picked up a stone that was impossible to carry and I dropped it where I stood. My heart sank at the sight of the wound written so boldly on the side. This one had caused me more pain than any other. The shame it brought to read it again anguished me, then angered me. This was the one stone that had become so much a part of me, and at times, defined who I was. It drove me and motivated me and it was often the thing that all other offenses stemmed from. I was afraid to let him see it.
“What does it say, child?” He asked.
With a bitter lump in my throat, and broken voice, I read it aloud. “The day my earthly father walked out on me; the day I became an orphan.” I looked at my savior with brokenness. “It is too heavy; I can not bring it to you.”
“My child, you will never have the strength to pick it up until you decide who it belongs to. It will always be too heavy until you resolve to bring it to me. Do you trust me?”
Because this stone had been with me so long, I wondered who I would be without it. I took only but a moment before I decided I did not need it. “Yes!” I screamed, with a renewed determination. I heaved the stone into my arms and carried it to him. What was an impossibility was becoming a reality. It became more possible with every step I took towards him.
This time, when I handed it to him, he did something different with it than all the other bricks and stones. Instead of dissolving it, he fashioned, formed and shaped it. What it was, I could not say until he had finished. For as big as it was, it was now small inside his hands.
He opened his hands and I strained to look closely. It was a beautiful jewel. Its beauty was so indescribable that it brought tears to my eyes just to gaze at it. He then fastened the jewel onto a crown and placed it on my head.
“My child, your pain, now given to me, has now become a gift.”
I looked at my savior with astonishment. What did he mean by this?
As if to answer my unasked question, he replied, “The bitterness and heaviness you carried is gone, but the pain you once felt has now become the Jewel of Compassion you carry. The Jewel of Compassion is a gift. You will feel the pain of orphans and outcasts because of the pain you went through. But you will not be afraid of this pain; it will drive you, and motivate you, and you will become who I created you to be because of it. You will fulfill your destiny because you your pain has been repurposed and redeemed.”
I fell to my knees and wept; not out of bitterness, or sadness, but for the sheer amazement of my savior.
When I looked up again, I saw that my prison walls were all but gone. He took my hand, and led me out into the glorious, beautiful sunlight.
My savior wiped the tears from my eyes. “Trust me.”
I knew I could.
I wrote “Castle to Cage” in three parts through the years. I actually began writing in the middle, during a time of deep pain and torment. After years of reflecting, I wondered, “How did it all happen?” And so I went back to the beginning and wrote the beginning. After I discovered what it means to have pain that has been redeemed… I finally wrote the end.
Author Anne Day 