Heart Stuff pt. 8 – Navigating the Unfamiliar

The heart is challenging territory and exploring its depths is a beautiful challenge for those who want Jesus to live there. It is the core of who we are. God created us with hearts, speaks to us through them, longs to make them whole and blesses us with His presence in them. And in certain seasons of life, He invites us to look around and see what lurks and lies hidden (and sometimes not so hidden) there.

Romantics know its terrain well, as do those with gifts of mercy and compassion. Over the years I’ve met some people with such emotional health and warmth – they just know how to love, be loved, relate well, be honest with their feelings, understand something of their motives, confess their sin and still know they are forgiven and wanted by the Savior, etc. I love these people. Would like to be one of them one day too. Sigh.

Intellectuals though, those with less emotional vocabulary and sensitivities have a harder time navigating its depths. These folks are the ones who lean into their heads. They often think spiritual maturity is found in books. In knowledge. I have spent most of my adult life as one of these people. Sigh. We justify and differentiate ourselves from our ‘heart-led’ brethren by saying stupid things like, “Well, I’m not emotional.” (Yeah, right.) Or, “I use my brain more than my heart.” (As if they are mutually exclusive.) Or, “I don’t have the gift of mercy.” (As if that makes it ok to be an insensitive jerk – cause you know, God made me that way.)

So, recognizing my inherent weakness in this area, I’m making this is a topic of great study. (ha ha – intellectually studying the emotional heart…yes, I’m pathetic, I know…) In doing so, I’m learning some interesting things about the process of digging into this vital and life-giving part of my life. Thought I’d share them here in bullet point form.

Navigating The Terrain Of The Heart:

• Brutal honesty is a key navigation tool. There are days I really like to lie to others and myself. Oh, I do it subtly enough. Usually cloak it somehow, under humility, self-effacing humor. Sometimes I prefer to blame others and point fingers, but the result is the same. I am trying to minimize that which I am responsible for and make me look less bad than I actually am. What I’ve found is that I’ve got to be brutally honest about what is going on in my heart. Am I angry? Sad? Disappointed? If I don’t name the emotion properly, no matter how embarrassing or revealing it may be, then what I do with it will almost always be wrong. Which leads me to my next point…
• Find a travel buddy. Just like you should never swim alone, you shouldn’t really go in to the heart for extended periods completely alone. Sometimes looking at heart stuff is like looking at clouds with a friend and trying to find shapes in them. “I see a bunny!” And your travel buddy says, “Are you crazy? That is clearly a John Deere tractor!” The equivalent might be, “I’m angry!” And your friend says, “Are you crazy? You are terrified!” My point is, having another point of view can open your eyes to things you would never see on your own. And back to the first point, it doesn’t do any good if you lie to your travel buddy. We need their honest evaluations.
• Jesus gets to lead the exploration. Unfortunately, I think many folks approach their hearts like they do most other things in their lives: with their agendas, expecting Jesus to join right in and follow their lead. Yeah, about that…Jesus doesn’t follow our lead. And the sooner we drop our expectations, our right to choose our speed, destination, etc. the sooner we actually get somewhere. Sort of like when my 10-year-old sits behind the wheel of our parked car. It is sort of cute and all, but we aren’t going anywhere till he gets in his seat. I know this because I’ve begun digging in to my heart and said something like, “Jesus, lets talk about my anger issues.” And He’s said, “Actually, I want to talk about your idolatry. And until we deal with that, we aren’t going anywhere.” And I have the choice at that moment to get brutally honest with myself and my travel buddy, or lie and stop all forward progress.
• Pack some snacks. I suggest this tongue-in-cheek because the journey to whatever is going on in your heart can be a glacial, circuitous one that can take a long, long time. Well, I guess Jesus shows up in some people’s lives and gets right to the heart of the matter and conforms them to His likeness overnight…but that sure hasn’t been my experience. Instead, the sanctification process in my life tends to move much slower than I like or want. And I’m learning how to slow down and keep up all at the same time.