Dear Faith Family,
It's amazing how quickly our hearts can calcify even if we hunger and thirst for living rightly. This is especially true when the stressors and toil of daily living are heightened as they have been throughout this past year. Before we know it, we are ever on the defensive. Every word and everyone a threat to what we have earnestly worked to safeguard, whether at the macrolevel (freedom, justice, truth) or in the micro-relations (health, dignity, responsible choice). Our hearts harden even in our active, persistent endurance. And here is how we know it: by the way we respond to daily offenses.
Take, for example, my interaction with a fellow shopper at our neighborhood grocery store last week. Having both wrapped up a quick stop, we got into our vehicles just a couple of spots apart. He pulled out first. I followed.
At the exit of the parking lot, he split the lanes. Not sure if he was going straight or turning right, I pulled up behind him on the far right side of the exit. To be fair, I was pretty close to his car. Not touching his car, but certainly closer than I should have been. I thought he was going to turn immediately, but he didn't. Instead, he turned around in his seat, threw up both middle fingers, and began to yell what I assume were a string of profanities that indicted my lack of neighborliness. And then he calmly drove away.
The driver was no ill-tempered youth. His flowing white beard and random assortment of bumper stickers led me to peg him as easily in his sixties. He seemed stable enough in the check-out line, and there was no odd behavior on our way to the parking lot. Certainly, my encroachment into his personal space was unnecessary, but should it elicit such a dramatic response? Obviously, there was more going on in this man's life and his heart. And that's the point. The way we react to other people, especially people who cross a boundary we've so earnestly defended, shows how soft--or hard--our hearts have become.
While it is not difficult to see the hardening taking place in another's reactions, we can easily miss it in our own.
I don't have to think too far back to recall a few instances in which my internal response looked a lot like my neighbor's in the grocery store parking lot. The offenses were real, some major, most minor, and even a few accidental. What, sadly, was consistent was my responsive temperature and volume. While only occasionally spilling out, the internal combustion is enough evidence of a heart hardening amid the stressors of faithful living. Unfortunately, I don't think my heart condition is unique. Rather, it seems to be a common disease among Jesus' followers.
Jesus tells us the issue I'm facing (and maybe you too?) is not an issue of anger or anxiety or even exhaustion, but rather love. Specifically, "abandoning the love you had at first." (Rev. 2:4). What keeps our hearts from crusting over as we strive to follow Jesus faithfully is not diligence or routine or doctrine (all of which are important), but love. More accurately, God's love for us and others.
In the same context in which Jesus names our issue, he provides for us the medicine for our healing: "Remember therefore from where you have fallen..." (Rev. 2:5).
Jesus implores us to remember the rhythmic beat of God's love for the world, including us. A melodic cadence that has filled our lives and a pulsing pattern that has shaped all of history. When we remember God's steady meter, it's quite easy to see how far out of beat we've fallen in our responses to daily offenses and offenders.
Psalms 136 and 139 are psalms for remembering. Psalm 136 for remembering that "his steadfast love endures" across all the ages and over every realm. Psalm 139 for remembering that his love is sewn into every fiber of your being and has encircled every season of your living. His love is, and has always been, "first" (see Jn. 3:16 & 1 Jn. 4:10).
Psalm 139 ends with a request of God to help keep our hearts soft and on beat with his. A prayer I encourage you to pray with me today, this week, and often in our patient endurance in following Jesus.
Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Test me and know my anxious thoughts and concerns
And see if there be any offensive--offbeat--way within me,
and lead me along the path
--in the metered pattern of your love--
ancient and everlasting.
Through Jesus Christ. Amen.
Love you, faith family! Praying our Father's blessing over you this week.