There were a few things that had to take some getting used to in regards to living that close to the tracks. One of those things, of course, was the sound of that horn which would blow out of nowhere, at midnight... 3 am ... 5 am ... every single night.
What might have been even worse than the noise of that blasting horn was the trembling of the ground beneath the rolling train. The entire house would shake! I kid you not, the window in my bedroom would begin to rattle way before I could even hear the train horn.
Why is that worse? Well, you see I grew up in an Apostolic Pentecostal church. We were often taught about Jesus returning... and for some reason whenever I would close my eyes and try to imagine what it would be like when He returned, I would imagine the ground trembling, trumpet blowing, a loud thunderous voice announcing the arrival of the Christ, and then I would sight Him descending on a cloud.
So, each and every time my room would begin to shake, no matter what I was doing at the time, it was almost as if I would hold my breath and all time would stand still until I heard the horn of that train. I lived in that house from the age of 6 to the age of 12... and I'm telling you every time that train passed by, I would be terrified waiting to see if it was Jesus returning.
Why terrified? Two reasons
Growing up we were taught to fear the Lord. He was powerful and He would judge you for everything bad you had ever done. I was never taught of His love for me.
Satan loves to whisper lies in the ears of Gods children, no age category is excluded. He would often visit me at even a young age and he loved to tell me how far short I fell from making God proud. He made me believe that I would never be able to make it to heaven, I was hell bound from the start. So I would tremble thinking "this is it... this is the end of my life, I am going to burn in the pit of hell for all of eternity... I am going to look at the face of a God who will be ashamed of His creation that is me!" I was only 7 the first time I had thoughts like this... it angers me how Satan weaves his little sneaky way into our minds like that.
As you can imagine, it was always a relief to hear the horn of that train. I knew I would be judged one day... another day ... but perhaps not today after all.
You know what I've learned since then? The devil is a liar! He is! He will whisper quiet things in your ear to make you believe almost anything... to make you believe they are your own thoughts and not his manipulating you!
How many of you, honestly, have ever been driving your car when all of a sudden you have the thought "What if I just run my car off the side of the road and crash."
Did you think you were weird? Did you think you were crazy? Did you think you were the only one?
It was a lie... all of it... you are not weird, not crazy, and you are not the only one. That is a very common practice among Satan. It was just an attack from him... a whisper in your ear.
How many different areas of your life have you allowed yourself to believe the lies of the enemy? Why don't you start today... whenever you begin to have thoughts like this, call the devil a liar to this face! Ask God to give you the wisdom you need to discern the voice of the enemy!
I'll leave you with this... the only thing I can really think back on when it came to those tracks and smile about.
Me and my brothers loved to run and put coins on the tracks for the train to smoosh when it passed by. Sometimes we would even make coin sandwiches...
Quarter . Penny . Dime . one atop the other...
I can't tell you how much money we wasted over the years making squished coins, but it never got old to us. We were always excited to walk up and down the tracks looking for the coin... then looking over it carefully to see the different shapes the train wheel made on it.
1 comment:
Great post. love the coins, I never would have thought of doing that:) thanks for linking up to the NOBH
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