When I was a little girl I began what was to become a life-long love for allegories. I loved reading stories that let me discover the story behind the story. One of my favorites was entitled Tales of the Kingdom. In a nutshell, it is about an enchanter that ruled over a city where he made everyone sleep in the day and work at night because he was jealous of the light that the sun gave off. The people who lived in his city felt hopeless. There were a few people though who remembered the good, kind King who had ruled the city before it was put under the enchanter’s spell. They would quietly tell their friends that the King was now living in the forest outside the city, and that if they dared to escape the enchanter they could go there to live in freedom with him. The enchanter had foreseen the quiet whisperings of truth that would be spoken into the ears of the broken people who were under his spell, so he set up counter measures from the beginning. He posted men at every street corner who would call out “There is no such thing as kings! Death to pretenders!” As if that was not enough he had other men wandering the streets who spent their whole day chanting “Nay-nay-nay! Nay-nay-nay!”

As a girl, I never really understood the purpose of these men. “Who would listen to them,” I wondered. Their chants seemed meaningless to me. But now, after going through the process of healing after discovering my husband’s infidelities, I totally get what they are about. I cannot tell you how many times I heard “There is no point in trying to heal your marriage,” or “Men never really change.” Their message was loud and clear: ‘QUIT PRETENDING!’ And between the moments of hearing these proclamations I heard the distant but distinct rhythm of the Nay-Sayers every time I turned on the television and saw a man on the sit-com cheat on his wife, or went to work and witnessed the ‘casual’ flirting going on between coworkers. “Nay-nay-nay” I would hear… “It is hopeless… Things will never get any better… Nay-nay-nay… you are a fool to stay with him… you will never be happy again…” The enchanter in the story wasn’t only evil; he was also very cunning in his attacks on the hearts and minds of those in his city. He understood that the words we hear, whether they are spoken out loud, or sensed in our hearts, hold an incredible amount of power over us. The best way to protect ourselves is by speaking the truth right back at them. During the time that I was under a constant attack from the Nay-Sayers I discovered that it wasn’t enough for me to just think to myself ‘that’s not true’. I had to say out loud the truth that spoke against whatever lie I was hearing at that time. Truth has an amazing ability to quiet the Nay-Sayers.

This is what I want for you today. To walk away from the Nay-Sayers and to combat their lies with the truth when they ambush your pursuit of hope and healing. Find your place of rest where the King can comfort you, and where you can be restored to the healthy, whole person that you were created to be.