Confession time.

I’ve missed a few issues. And not because I didn’t have something to say, God had plenty to show me, but I didn’t stop long enough to listen.

Instead, I let busyness and stress take the lead. I told myself I’d wait until it “clicked,” but really, I was avoiding what God had already pointed to: pride, self-judgment, laziness, all showing up in how I saw myself when things got hard.

I’ve always promised that I’d never publish an issue just to hit a deadline. That each topic would be something God had walked me through first. And this one on altars is no different. It just took longer because God had some tearing down to do in my life.

What follows is what God taught me: how false altars form, how we try to fix them ourselves, and what it looks like to let Him remove them from our lives.

Thank you for your patience and your presence. This little newsletter community means more to me than you know. Expect some surprise emails soon too, I owe you a few extra issues!

Love you all and God bless,
Addison

Moses had been gone too long.
Forty days up a mountain covered in smoke and fire. 

No word. No updates.

At first, the people waited.
Then they worried.
Then they wondered: “What if he’s never coming back?”

They’d already lost everything once.
Now the man who led them out of Egypt, the one who parted the sea, the one who made sense of the chaos… was just gone.

That’s when fear took the reins.

They found Aaron and told him the thing they didn’t dare say out loud before:

Aaron, Moses’ right-hand man, caved.
He took their jewelry, the very gold meant to be used for the construction of God’s temple, and melted it into a calf.

And after it was complete, Aaron’s words fell out like poison:

The people didn’t second-guess it.

They rose early, brought their offerings, danced and worshipped at the calf’s feet.

Fear whispered they were now responsible for their own provision.
Fear told them they were forgotten and abandoned. 
Fear drove them to build an idol to replace Yahweh…

We like to think we’d never make the same mistake as Israel.
That we’d never build something to replace God.
We do it all the time though.

It doesn’t start with defiance. It starts with pain.

You get betrayed.
You lose someone you love.
You’re shamed for being too much or not enough.

The wound opens. And in slips fear.

We don’t want to believe those thoughts.
However, when God feels far, or we don’t like His silence, we start looking for something that can answer faster.

That’s when the lie shows up.

You reach for relief. Something to dull the ache.
A scroll. A snack. A project. A playlist. A purchase.
Just enough to quiet the panic.

It works, for a little while.

So you do it again. And again.

You’re not trying to sin. You’re trying to survive.
But each time you return, it costs a little more.

Each time you choose it over God, it lays another stone at your feet.
Until one day, you realize: you didn’t just fall into a habit.

You built an altar.

Not one you meant to worship at.
Just one you kept showing up to.

At first, it seemed harmless. Maybe even helpful.
Not anymore. Now it owns you. It demands more, gives less, and you’re more miserable each time you return.

You don’t remember when it started, but you can’t imagine being free.

So, how do you get free?

If you’re like me, your first instinct isn’t to destroy the altar.

It’s to improve it.

We swap out the addiction for a discipline.
Replace one identity with another that sounds more acceptable.

We run marathons instead of hitting the slots.
We swap cake out for kale.
We chase productivity like it can heal us.
We journal, clean, hustle, “grow.”

From the outside? It looks like freedom.

We seem more focused.
We sound more grounded.
We feel more in control.

Here’s the problem:
If the root is still fear,
If the lie is still running the show,
All we’ve done is decorate the altar.

We’re still looking to something other than God to save us.

And the enemy is more than happy to let us have a “cleaner” version of the same trap,
as long as it still keeps us from trusting Yahweh.

Every altar makes a demand.
And only one leads to life.

So don’t settle for a prettier prison.
You were made for freedom.

You may feel stuck.
Buried under behaviors you can’t break.
Tangled in lies you didn’t know you were believing.

However, God’s invitation is simple:

Tear it down.

Not with striving.
Not with shame.
With Him.

Start here:

“God, what are the altars in my life?”

Then wait.

Sometimes the answer comes quickly, other times, it echoes quietly across days—
like a lyric you can’t shake, a thought you can’t outrun.

When He shows you, don’t rush to fix it.
That impulse, jumping into action without Him, is just another altar of self-reliance.

Instead, confess it.

Out loud. Simple. Honest.

“I thought this would save me. But only You can. I’m sorry.”

Then ask the next question:

“What do I do now?”

This is where we brace ourselves: for shame, for punishment, for a to-do list.
More often than not, His answer sounds like freedom instead.

He might ask you to lay something down.
He might tell you to pick something up.
The important thing is: whatever He says, obey.

Not to earn His love, but because you already have it. That’s repentance.

Not groveling.
Not self-loathing.
Just agreement.

Agreement with who He is, what’s true, and the life He’s calling you into.

The goal isn’t just altar removal.

It’s a personal relationship with your Father, the King of the universe.

You’re always building something.

Every time you react in fear.
Every time you reach for control.
Every time you choose what to do with your pain instead of surrendering it, you’re placing a stone.

It doesn’t look like worship, but it is.

False altars offer quick relief, but demand more than you realized and take what you never meant to give.

Slowly, they drain you.

That’s why God steps in.
Not to scold you.
To set you free.

So go to Him.

Ask Him where the altars are.
Let Him show you.
Let Him raze them down to dust.

Then replace them with something true.

Until next time,
Addison

PS: Once the false altars are destroyed, then it’s time to let God build true ones to Him in your life. That’s what we’ll be covering next week. See you then!