Spiritually Stronger

Ready to Get Unstuck?

Hey, friend.

What you know and I know is that life is NOT easy. Life is full of fun parts, so much joy, and multiple items to add to your gratitude list every day. AND (I’m intentionally not using the word but here . . . because all of this is true at the same time) life is full of heartbreaking, disappointing, hard moments. It’s these hard times that get us stuck and hold us back from living life as fully as we mean to. Fears, worries, and regrets bog us down and get in our way. The good news, though, is that it doesn’t have to be that way. You don’t have to let any of THAT hold you back. And I’m going to show you how. It’s a path I’ve walked and what I chronicle in my book Don’t Let That Hold You Back. It’s a path I want to take you on too. That’s why this interactive devotional exists: so we can take a journey toward being unstuck and spiritually stronger together.

I first wrote the six words Don’t Let That Hold You Back in my little purple notebook after digging it out of the bottom of my purse in a dark rehearsal space in Midtown Manhattan. At a read-through for a musical (that I fully expect we will see on Broadway in the coming years), this phrase crystallized for me a journey I had been on and an invitation I wanted to extend. See, I wasn’t just IN New York City that day. I LIVED in New York City that day.

People live in places, Annie, you might be thinking. So why is the fact that you lived in New York City so significant? If you had told twenty-year-old Annie that she would one day live in the greatest city in the world (my opinion, but a good opinion), she might have been surprised, but she would not have been shocked. She would’ve been more like, “Fascinating! For real? Well done!” because she didn’t know yet what would be stolen, killed, and destroyed in her. But she also didn’t know how brave she could be.

But forty-five-year-old me? She knows. I have walked it, lived it, felt it (sometimes against my will!), and am living a new way because I know what was holding me back. And it doesn’t get to hold me back anymore. I am spiritually stronger because I made a choice (well, a million little daily choices) to be. And living in New York City is how I know it.

Living in New York probably won’t be how you know that you are spiritually stronger and no longer held back. I’m not here to encourage you to live my story. I’m here to be the guide on a path that will introduce you to how to live your story. A beautiful, expansive, strong, brave, you-shaped story.

I wrote my book Don’t Let That Hold You Back and this interactive devotional to accompany it because I believe in my gut (and because it’s stated over and over again in Scripture) that there is an invitation to full and abundant life with your name on it. And I am not willing for you to miss that party. I’m generally unwilling for any of us to miss any parties, honestly. Don’t Let That Hold You Back tells the whole story. Spiritually Stronger is the rehearsal space where we get to workshop it.* I’m so glad we’re here together.


THE FRAMEWORK

There are two ideas Jesus introduces in the Gospels—the first four books of the New Testament in the Bible: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—that provide the framework we are going to journey through together. The first comes from His words in John 10:10:

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

We get held back—feeling stuck and weak—by the things that have been stolen, killed, and destroyed in our lives. You feel that, right? We are going to deal with what we can and ask God to heal what we can’t so these things don’t hold us back any longer. Because we want the full, abundant life Jesus offers; we want to participate fully in the calling that God has invited us into. But how? Well, Jesus tells us how in Matthew 7:7–8:

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

See? We’re going to get spiritually stronger by asking, seeking, and knocking! This is the path we get to walk together. I am SO ready and SO excited for you. Digging into and walking out these truths has changed my life. It’s going to change yours too. Each day for the next forty days contains the following:

• a scripture to anchor us (thank God for His Word!)
• a reading to give us the meat of what we are thinking about and working on
• interactive prompts, reflection questions, and activities to work through and apply to your own story
• a Don’t Hold Back challenge to help you lean into the spiritual rhythms that will make you stronger so you can carry what you’re working on into your day

We have forty days together—eight weeks of five days each—and some Sabbath Space (which includes processing, prayer, and a tip for practicing Sabbath) in between. The first twenty days will walk you through how to deal with and heal from what’s been stolen, killed, and destroyed. (Breezy, right?) Then, in the last twenty days, we will turn toward asking, seeking, and knocking. (The fun part!) This is the same outline I followed in Don’t Let That Hold You Back.

While this book is organized into forty days, you and God are the bosses of your life. If you need to take it at a different pace, do it. I just want you to get to the end of the forty devotions, through it all. There is something for you in each one. And I want you to be gentle with yourself and tell yourself the whole entire (sometimes brutal) truth. You can do that; I know it. (But maybe make sure your therapist has some open slots in the next few weeks too?)

On the other side of day 40, you’ll be spiritually stronger and armed to fully participate in the expansive adventure that is your life. LET’S GOOOOOO!