Greetings Dear Reader,
Yesterday, when I wrote about how we use past fear to
determine future treatment of others, I held back on a byproduct that does
great harm. When we submit to fear, one
of our dismissive responses is to wall off our hearts. We fear getting hurt so we petrify compassion
and love to protect ourselves.
When considering fear, one of the things we seem to avoid is
our own accountability in creating it. We
get hurt, perhaps over and over, and we harden our hearts toward the source of
the pain. Our fear of being hurt again
causes us to withhold love from those in desperate need of it. We tell ourselves we still love others but refuse
to take the risk of loving them actively.
After a time, our hearts become stony toward individuals or
people in general. We lie and say we
have forgiven them when in truth we are walled off from them. We have hardened our hearts and separate ourselves
from family and friends. We treat them
as enemies but not in the way Christ requires.
We say we do not hate and that we are only indifferent. The difficulty is that we are not allowed to
be indifferent. We must actively love
everyone, especially those who we are close to in relationship.
It does not matter how long we have built the wall in our
hearts. What matters is that we decide
today that no person is unworthy of our active love. We choose today that we will not have hearts
of stone. It is dangerous but it is
necessary. There is a certainty that if we
have hearts that love we will take damage.
The matter is that we avoid the true litmus test of our
hearts. Do we react to others in a way
that we want Christ to react to us? We
do not want people to be hardhearted regarding us. We want grace and mercy when we are wrong but
dare to withhold it from others. We
harden our hearts and risk the very tenderness we need.
I must not allow even shale to develop on my heart. It must remain tender even toward those who
judge my past and spurn me. I am not
deserving of their love but Christ’s commands about love are to everyone. They are for everyone. They are an obligation for everyone. We fear pain so we harden our hearts, Dear
Reader. I would remind you of what the
Father promises us. “I will give you a
new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart
of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”
He will not do it against our will but will willingly do this if we
allow it. It is a surgery worth having.
Wishing you joy in the journey,
Aramis Thorn
Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every
writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a
homeowner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure
store.”
(͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Every human story is part of the great story that leads
to the Father getting everything back to Good.
Contacts for Aramis
Thorn:
#aramisthorn
Bookings: aramisthorn@aramisthorn.com
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