Following Your Heart

I hear people say "follow your heart" all the time. I see beautifully made pictures on Facebook with that quote, and I see well-meaning people give that piece of advice to struggling friends. Follow your heart. It sounds so simple and it would make life so much simpler if we could just decide to follow our hearts. I'd love to follow my heart and do whatever I felt like doing! It presents itself as an ideal solution to our own happiness. But beware those sugary sweet words of advice; they'll end up tasting sour as vinegar.

The problem with following our hearts is that our hearts are deceitful. Jeremiah 17:9 says "The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?" Our hearts lie. We look inside ourselves and we think we know what we want and/or need, but it's not the truth. God knows what we need, his plan is sovereign, and always for our good (Jeremiah 29:11). Jeremiah says we don't even know how bad our own hearts are. Think about that for a minute-- our hearts are deceiving us already and we're blinded to the fact that they are deceiving us, so we can't even understand how bad our own desires are! I'm not saying that everything we want or desire for ourselves is bad, but we are inherently selfish beings and we don't ultimately know what is best for us. Because our hearts are deceitful, it is vital to pray for God's leading and his wisdom in our lives. We have to be discerning about whether we are following our own hearts or listening to the leading of the Holy Spirit whispering to our hearts. When we are open to being obedient to God's voice in our lives, it is truly amazing how our own wills are brought into alignment with his. We then start to desire what God desires for us. In this way, we are no longer so disappointed when things we thought we wanted don't come to pass.

Here's an example: a couple of years ago, we had the chance to move to Canada (where my husband is from) and take over a family business. We were so excited and couldn't wait to get everything in order and ready to go! We prayed about it often. Although it seemed like exactly what we wanted and had ever hoped for, we still prayed God's will over it. Through the months it took to try and get everything settled, we prayed for God's will to be revealed even though we really wanted to move. After several months of planning and praying, we found that what we thought had been our hearts' desire in moving turned out to be contrary to the will of God, and in praying for God's will, he had changed the desires of our hearts and we no longer wanted to move. Amazing how he does that! Something we thought we had so wanted ended up being something we didn't want after we prayed for God's will to be revealed in our lives.

It's easy to get caught up in your own desires, your own plans, your own hopes and dreams. There's nothing wrong with having desires, plans, hopes and dreams. We just have to realize that they may not be what God has planned for us. However, when we pray for his will to be accomplished in our lives, and truly desire to be obedient, we won't be disappointed if our own plans don't come true. God's plan is always the best plan, and when we desire nothing more than to walk in his will, we will experience the fullness of God's blessings for us.

A matter of life and death

Our words have power.  I'm sure y'all have heard that a million times before today, but it's true.  I think we don't always realize just how powerful our words are, especially when it comes to our husbands.  Ladies, we have the power to make or break our husbands.  It all comes down to our words.

There are many, many passages in the Bible which talk about the words we speak.  Proverbs 18:21 says "The tongue can bring death or life; those who love to talk will reap the consequences" (NLT).  It's ours to choose whether we bring death or life to our husbands (or to anyone).  I think it is especially important that we are careful with the words we choose to use with our husbands.  (I think we should be careful with our words to everyone, but this post is specifically about marriages today.)  We're so comfortable in our own homes and with our families.  For most of us, our husband is our best friend.  We're comfy and we let our guard down because we are in our own space.  This is a good thing, but it also means that we don't always put the effort in that we should.  We don't think before we speak because we're comfortable.  We say things to our spouses we would never say to a casual acquaintance.  This should not be the case!  Our spouses deserve at least as much respect as the guy in the office next to yours; the teacher in the class next to you; the mom you sit next to at your Mother's Day Out group.  If you wouldn't say it to them, you shouldn't be saying it to your spouse.  Speaking harshly, negatively, disrespectfully to your spouse is a quick way to bring death to your relationship.  That's what the Proverb above says-- your words can bring life or death and if you speak with words of death you'll suffer the consequences.

And not just you, but your husband will suffer the consequences as well.  If you're berating your spouse, he'll start to believe what you say and act accordingly.  Sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy if you will.  If your words are disrespectful towards your husband, especially in public, you're bringing death to your husband.  Proverbs 12:4 says "A worthy wife is a crown for her husband, but a disgraceful woman is like cancer in his bones" (NLT).  Just as cancer can bring death, so do your disrespectful words.  They eat away at your husband until the spirit inside him withers and dies.

On the other hand, if you speak words of life, you lift your husband up!  When you support him and affirm him with your words, you empower your husband to rise above.  If you are affirming your husband and showing him that you place value on him it makes him strive to be worthy of that affirmation.  When you do so publicly it is a wonderful example of how a wife should treat her husband.  You are then "a crown" for your husband rather than a "cancer in his bones."  I would certainly rather be a crown to my husband!  I would never want to bring him death; it hurts my heart to even think about bringing death or pain to my husband.  Some of y'all bring death on a regular basis, and you probably don't realize the extent of the damage you're causing.

Our words are either death or they are life.  I know that I don't want to bring death to my husband and I'm sure y'all don't either.  Start examining what you say more closely; think before you speak, even- maybe especially- when you're comfortable in your setting.  Speak life!