"For what shall we do when we wake one day to find that we have lost touch with our heart and with the very refuge where God's presence resides (John Eldredge/Brent Curtis in Sacred Romance)."
Take a few moments and think about the enemies of your heart. What is it that currently keeps you from being in touch with your heart? When you have thought about it sufficiently, then complete this exercise.
1. List the things you thought about in the question above.
2. For each thing you've listed, what is the immediate purpose of that activity?
3. For each thing you've listed, what is the over-arching purpose?
After considering your answers mark each thing on the list with an A or a B.
A = stop the task because your heart isn't in it.
B = rethink the task and renew your heart in it.
For example, one of the things that can make me lose touch with my heart is laundry. It is such a mundane routine task that I feel never gets accomplished or appreciated. Here is my list.
1. Laundry. It's purpose is to clean the clothes. It's overarching purpose is to take care of God's provisions for me, the clothes and the people who wear them.
After considering these answers I give this task a B. I am much more joyful doing the laundry knowing that I have such a worthy over-arching purpose in completely the task and even if the kids don't seem to appreciate it, I know that God does.
The exercises we will be doing in this study are excellent material for a personal journal. Complete each exercise in your journal and then share you insights with us on the Riders For Christ blog.
In this study, "we will be exploring the hidden questions of our hearts, born out of the stories of our lives. In the process of God's resurrection of our heart we will discover our soul's deepest longing and receive an invitation to embrace it as the most important part of our lives.
Discover how God has been speaking to us through our heart all along. This pilgramage will bring us toward a destination that was set within all of our hearts, which in some way we have known, longed for, and have been haunted by since we were children."
When I did my list I wasn't surprised to see laundry, cleaning chores, and vehicle upkeep on the list of things dulling my heartsong but what did surprise me was when Church and Sunday School ended up on the list. Granted it was the "bluest day" of the year when I drew up my list, but it took a lot of honest soul-searching to put those two on the list.
ReplyDeleteAfter evaulating the top three, I was re-energized in my performance of the tasks and joyfully going about taking care of God's provisions for me and those entrusted to my care.
Trying not to bias the outcome, I wrote out the purpose for Sunday School - to learn about God and Fellowhip and the purpose for going to Church-- to learn about God and join in corporate worship. Those seem admirable enough but not enough to put my heart and soul and mind into them. What was the over-arching purpose and would it be enough to renew my heart or would I scratch them from my to-do list because my heart was no longer in it.
I contemplated their over-arching purpose for several days and realized the purpose was to "Truly Seek God". . . to learn more about who He is and get a glimpse of his face now and then. The bible says that "God inhabits the praises of his people." So what better way to be in God's presence than joining in corporate worship with a sanctuary full of people praising him.
Not everything on my list was able to recapture my heart, a few social clubs I belong to now out of a "once a member, always a member" obligation got put on the 'stop list.' I was surprised and the relief I felt when I made that decision. I am excited to discover something I am more passionate about to fill their timeslots.
What kind of things went on your list? When you really let your heart be honest, were there any surprises?