Heart Secrets

I feel bruised.  Utterly battered.  And it's not my body.  It's my heart.  And it's radiating to, throughout the rest of me.

Something happened last night.  Something different than other nights.  Although similar things happen most nights.

Have you ever woken up from sleep, and have walked in on a conversation between your spirit and God?  It's overwhelming just thinking about the magnitude.  The power.  The thought, of what that means.  The comfort.  That there is something bigger than just us.  Than just flesh.

I never remember details in the morning.  But I do remember having a holiness visited.

I knew something was going to happen last night.  But I didn't expect to feel so war weary.  And that's what it must have been.  War.  Spiritual war, over my heart.

My favorite author of all time is John Eldredge.  He is able to speak to my darkest, the way no one can. God has used him to ravenously rip open heart wounds, and allow healing.

And so I read his words with trepidation.  Slowly.  Knowing more work is to come.  And exhaustion.

He is known to use classic reads to illustrate points. Illustrate the beauty of God's heart.  But it always catches off guard.

Bear with me as I share thee story that opens to my story.  (It starts slow, but it ends in beauty)

And being very tired and having nothing inside him, he felt so sorry for himself that the tears rolled down his cheeks.  What put a stop to all this was a sudden fright.  Shasta discovered that someone or somebody was walking beside him.  It was pitch dark and he could see nothing.  And the the Thing (or Person) was going so quietly that he could hardly hear any footfalls.  What he could hear was breathing.  His invisible companion seemed to breathe on a very large scale . . . . 
     If the horse had been any good-or if he had known how to get any good out of the horse-he would have risked everything on a breakaway and a wild gallop.  But he knew he couldn't make that horse gallop.  So he went on at a walking pace and the unseen companion walked and breathed beside him.  At last he could bear it no longer.  "Who are you?" he said, scarcely above a whisper.
     "One who has waited long for you to speak," said the Thing.  It's voice was not loud, but very large and deep . . . 
     "Oh please-please do go away.  What harm have I ever done you?  Oh, I am the unluckiest person in the whole world!"  Once more he felt the warm breath of the Thing on his hand and face.  "There," it said, "that is not the breath of a ghost.  Tell me your sorrows."  Shasta was a little reassured by the breath:  so he told how he had never known his real father or mother and had been brought up sternly by the fisherman.  And then he told the story of his escape and how they were chased by lions and forced to swim for their lives; and of all their dangers in Tashbaan and about his night among the tombs and how the beasts howled at him out of the desert.  And he told about the heat and thirst of their desert journey and how they were almost at their goal when another lion chased them and wounded Aravis.  And also, how very long it was since he had had anything to eat.
     "I do not call you unfortunate," said the Large Voice.  "Don't you think it was bad luck to meet so many lions?"  said Shasta.  "There was only one lion," said the Voice.  "What on earth do you mean?  I've just told you there were at least two the first night, and  . . . "  "There was only one; but he was swift of foot."  "How do you know?"
     "I was the lion."
     And as Shasta gaped with open mouth and said nothing, the Voice continued.  "I was the lion who forced you to join with Aravis.  I was the cat who comforted you among the houses of the dead.  I was the lion who drove the jackals from you while you slept.  I was the lion who gave the horses the new strength of fear for the last mile so that you should reach King Lune in time.  And I was the lion you do not remember who pushed the boat in which you lay, a child near death, so that it came to shore where a man sat, wakeful at midnight, to receive you."
     "Then it was you who wounded Aravis?"
     "It was I."
     "But what for?"
     "Child," said the Voice, "I am telling you your story, not hers."
               (C.S. Lewis, The Horse and His Boy) (Which I took from John Eldredge's Waking the Dead)

I read this as if it were a fairy tale.  It's lovely.  My heart felt an enlightening, as it does with any story that we are shown the greatness of the whole. . . . But that was it.  Until John turned that story into our story.

He goes on to say that our life, is a story.  Filled with twists and turns.  Great moments.  Horrific failures.  Many firsts.  And through all of these different experiences, our heart has "learned" something.  Some truth.  A lot is false rubbish that we cling too, and soon believe to be true.

He asks heart questions.  "Is your heart good?  Does your heart really matter?  What has life taught you about that?" 

I'm reading this with a quiet heart.  Alert.  The house is asleep.  It's dark.  And I'm primed to have my heart rummaged.

And then John says, "Imagine for a moment that God is walking softly beside you.  You sense his presence, feel his warm breath.  He says, 'Tell me your sorrows.'"

In the stillness, it was as if God took my weather-beaten, hardened hands in his and asked me what my sorrows were.

The simplicity and rawness of the question shook all around.  And the hurted, angry, deeply-buried tears came so fast.  Oh, to be asked that question.

But he wasn't done there.  He wanted to know what I believed about my heart.

I didn't want to answer this question. And honestly, I couldn't think of anything.  I thought naively that I must simply be wonderful, and have no beliefs about my heart.

And then it came.  The ripping.  Shredding.  Of my innermost.  A 31 year old secret that I haven't had words for.  Felt, - yes. 

Our most hurt, often starts with our family.  Truth.  Hard truth, but truth.

I don't know how to say the next part  politically correct.  So I'll say it, the way it is.

My heart was not seen, growing up.  My innermost, God-created, was squashed.  Disciplined.  Re-directed.  Ignored.  Misinterpreted.

And that's what I believe most about my heart.  That it's not seen.  That it doesn't matter.  And if anything, it's wrong.  My heart is wrong.  Even with the best intentions, I don't trust it.

What if I'm a self-made introvert?  Because I believe that my heart isn't seen.  So why bother?  Why give it out?  Every time I do, it's squashed.  Rejected.  Noses turn up.  The weird glances.  The appalled stares.  Who wouldn't be driven to lead a loner life?

To have your deepest, darkest wound handed to you.  The horror.  The relief of truth.  And the over-bearing burden of what to do next.  With this knowledge.

John always says to invite God into our hurts.  To reveal more, to bring healing.  When we know truth, we know what we're up against.  We know better how to protect, how to fight.  How to pray.

I woke up many times last night to a spirit/God conversation.  I woke up to thoughts and songs playing in my heart.  None of it I can remember.

My entire chest is aching today.  Not the inside, but the outside.  As if I participated in highly strenuous activities.  But I haven't.  Because I sit on the couch.

There was war last night.  And it was over my heart.  And it was dirty and terrible.  I know because I can feel the physical impact.  The weight of evil fighting so hard, dragging it's claws through my chest.  Fighting to hold on.

I know this is the beginning of this part of my heart healing.  And with my healing history, it's years long.  I'm in no rush.  But I am looking forward to stepping out on the other side.

I do want to say, that I don't have resentment or hard feelings toward family members.  It really is not there.  As humans we do the best we can with what we know.

And thank the Lord, I'm done.