about tendencies of the heart

I've been trying to wrap my mind around feelings.
More specifically, I've been trying to suss out why I think it is important both to honor your feelings AND to honor the Lord - something that can often seem impossible to do simultaneously.

My emotional health as a Christian is something that many conversations with friends, long scribbled notes in my journal, and the written words of both the bible and people far wiser than myself have led me to ponder.  As an individual, I find it important.  As a Church, I find it crucial.

Tonight, here's just a few thoughts.  Perhaps more later.

------------------------------------------------------

I believe that God is unchanging.  I believe that he is the same yesterday as he was today and as he will be tomorrow. I believe that he is a rock, a solid foundation.  I believe that he is immoveable, certain, and true.

I, on the other hand, am as mutable as can be.
Yesterday I was something and today I am something very new.
Yesterday I felt one way and today I feel the other.

It is this changing that makes it hard sometimes to relate to an eternal God - as a young woman with active emotions, I don't always feel like what is true is actually true.  Do you know what I mean?  One day, I really do feel the deep love and worth of Christ within me.  And on another day I feel self-doubt, fear, and shame.

These sort of contradictions between feelings and truth has proven very complicated for me.  But also important; here's why:
1) my feelings make me aware of how deeply human I am
and 2) my feelings make me aware of the tendencies of my heart.

As I sort through being a human with feelings (this is probably a condition you find yourself in, too) those two revelations have helped me place myself in relation to the Lord who loves and created me.  They remind me (often) that I am not God - how often I feel hopeless, helpless, jealous, lazy, or mad! But they remind me too (I wish more often) that I am in the process of being made new; through the tendency of my heart and the feelings it holds, I have begun to watch myself being sanctified and made more like Christ.

To know your heart and your tendency to feel one way or another is a good and wise thing.  To know your tendency to feel worthless after a disappointment  or hopeless after you fail, or jealous when someone else gets something you want - that is useful information to keep on record.  Because when you find yourself in those similar situations and your feelings change, you become eye-witness to your own renewal.

Feelings, I find, are something I have very little control over changing on my own.  Which is why to know your feelings, pray over them, and have them altered is like experiencing a victory of the Holy Spirit in your life.  There is beauty when you look into your heart and can be surprised at the joy you find there, or at the perseverance and fight, or at the generosity you couldn't muster up to feel on your own.

I do not believe that our feelings are always truth.  Sometimes they reflect truth; sometimes they reflect lies.  They are not constant.  Only God is constant.  But our feelings are important.

They remind us that there is only one God.  And they remind us that He is in the process of making us more like himself.



PS. If you are interested in reading about these things further, friends of mine have recently recommended the book The Emotionally Healthy Church, this blog post, and excerpts on the topic of emotion found in Bread for the Journey, by Henri J.M. Nouwen.  

about popular music

If you were thinking to yourself - "If only if only someone would let me know the three best pop songs I should be listening to right now!" - then have no fear; I got you.

Why?  Because pop music is perfect for dancing in kitchens, keeping you awake during your morning commute, and singing into your hairbrush.  You are welcome.

1) Sweet Nothing - Calvin Harris Feat. Florence Welch
    Why? - because it's Calvin.  It's Florence.  They are awesome.  This is awesome.  And the club-dance-beat makes me want to pump my fists and throw my body around like the awkward white girl with no rhythm that I am.

2) Next to Me - Emeli Sande
     Why? - because she has a great first name and I'm pretty sure she's talking about Jesus.

3) It's Time - Imagine Dragons
    Why? - because you know how sometimes you imagine moments of your life as if they were movie scenes with like cool music playing in the background? (anyone?)  Well this song is playing during my moments of super-happiness or feeling victorious or times of just general awesomeness.

about if grocery stores were boyfriends

I’m pretty sure it’s possible to have a crush on a grocery store. 

Today I popped into Wegman’s on my way home from work and kept thinking about how nice the place looked, and how sweet it was to be offering me fresh samples of organic apples, and how considerate to ask if they could carry my bags for me, and what a good time I had looking at the train above the milk section (THEY HAVE A TRAIN!), etc. etc.   I even got so flustered that I knocked a bottle of carbonated water on the ground and walked away quickly as it spun and sprayed everywhere. 

I know you aren’t a person, Wegman’s, but I think I’m in love.  Except maybe you should foot the bill next time? 

All this daydreaming about the Weg (pet name) had me thinking – you can DEFINIETLY equate grocery stores with boyfriends. 

Think about it. 

Food Lion is like that sketchy guy you maybe decide to see a few times, but it’s always sort of icky and disappointing and lacking what you really want.

Whole Foods is that raised-in-New-England-boarding-school type who’s never short of wine and cheese but makes you feel sort of inferior.

And Joe’s (Trader, that is) is always the perfect balance of quirk and fun – you’re guaranteed to feel wonderfully about all your choices. 

I could go all day on these analogies (just kidding, I can’t. that’s why I only listed three), but you get the picture. 

Here’s to serendipitously finding your supermarket soul mate! 

one poem

The unchanging

During some moments

my imagination builds

a house I like to go to;

small enough for just three

rooms: for bed, for books,

and a kitchen. 

I build it along a quiet pond

where the light is always

gray in every season,

and go there when I am

changing and want the walls

to embrace me,

and to walk into the quiet

of a place I know

the smell of and I can be alone.

I go on days when I forget

everything, or know nothing

or cannot set myself to be

one thing or not

that thing at all, and stare at the walls

which stay unchanging

whoever walks into their rooms

or whether night has fallen

and winds shifted in sway

and  I feel so dreadfully human -  

with the way I’m always different

or not in one place at all. 

 -by me, 1/12/13