Another Brick In The Wall

(The Journey of Grace)

Draw me nearer, nearer, blessed Lord,

to the cross where Thou hast died.

Draw me nearer, nearer, blessed Lord,

to Thy precious bleeding side.

That hymn has been echoing in my heart all week. And it leads me to a question:

When is close—close enough?

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1. The Journey, Not the Point

We’re not talking about a trip from Point A to Point B.

This is the journey of the soul—a journey that keeps shaping us as we walk.

A journey is more than a dot on a chart.

Yet many Christians are tempted to think of the life of faith as a single point: “I found the truth. I’m safe. I’ve arrived.”

But Jesus never invited us to settle at a point. He invites us into a journey—growing, stretching, lifelong.

There’s an old word for getting stuck on the point: punctilious.

It literally means “point.” And a punctilious religion camps on a moment—conversion, a doctrine, a high experience—and forgets that God is always moving us forward.

Why must it be a journey?

Because our potential in Christ is huge.

There are minds to stretch, feelings to discover, songs to sing, and new things to create.

No single point can hold all of that.

Jesus told a parable about this (Luke 11:5–8).

A man and his wife have settled in for the night when a knock sounds. A friend has arrived from a long journey—hungry and tired.

“Come in,” they say, “you must be exhausted!”

But the pantry is bare.

So the husband pounds on his neighbor’s door.

“Please, we’ve got friends on a journey and nothing to give them.”

The neighbor grumbles from bed, but the man keeps knocking until bread is given.

It’s a simple picture with a deep reminder: people are on a journey, and they need something we can give.

If we think faith is just a point, we start demanding that everyone stand exactly where we stand.

“Why aren’t you at my point yet? Why don’t you believe exactly the way I do?”

But if we see life as a journey, we begin to say,

“I can see God is still working in you. I can see Jesus drawing you nearer, nearer to His precious bleeding side.

You’ll grow. You’ll discover. You’ll do it in God’s timing.”

Faith is a journey—tailor-made by God for every one of us.

Different scenery, different pace, same loving Guide.

Sooner or later, every pilgrim comes to a hard place…a wall.

A moment when you ask, How do I go on? Where do I turn now?

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2. The Wall We Meet

Every long journey eventually runs into a wall.

Not a wall of brick or stone, but the kind you feel inside:

a place where the road seems to end, where questions get heavy, where you wonder, Can I really keep going?

A scene from the film The Mission captures this vividly.

Rodrigo Mendoza was a slave trader who had killed his own brother and carried crushing guilt.

A Jesuit priest led him on a hard climb up a jungle waterfall while he dragged a heavy net of weapons and armor—his past—behind him.

Exhausted, he finally reached the top, where the very tribe he had once enslaved met him.

One of them stepped forward, cut the rope, and let the burden fall away.

In that instant Mendoza knew forgiveness:

the one he had wronged most had set him free.

Sooner or later we all meet a wall like that.

It’s not a place we would ever schedule.

God brings us there.

It can be excruciating—but also wonderful.

At the wall we face our dark side—anger, manipulation, envy, fear.

Often the things we despise most in others are mirrors of what lives in us.

And at the wall we hear God’s invitation:

Will you let go of the weight? Will you trust Me to forgive and reshape you?

It’s where we accept our acceptance—where “God loves me” stops being a slogan and becomes a living reality.

Where the Spirit whispers,

“I know every corner of your heart. I know the darkness you see today. And I still call you beloved.”

You may come through the wall one brick at a time.

But every brick removed is another layer of fear gone and another layer of love revealed.

The world may tell you, in the words of that old Pink Floyd line,

> “All in all you’re just another brick in the wall.”

But the gospel says something far better:

You are a living stone, chosen and precious, built into a spiritual house (1 Peter 2:5).

Unconditional love—just saying the words is beautiful and frightening.

It means loving whoever walks around the next corner—no matter their race, their smell, their story.

It means giving yourself to people who may never thank you or even like you.