The Eyes of the Heart, Pt. 2

It has been over a year (almost year and a half) since I have written and published a blog. Written, yes. Published, no. A lot has happened in the last year, but my reason/s for not writing has nothing to do with the insanity and sheer nuttiness of the world… if anything, it has been for the insanity and nuttiness within me. As I’ve hinted in previous blogs, it may have had something to do with a girl, although I won’t really touch on that here. What it has had to do with though, is my journey with God.

I’d like to say that for the last year+, life has been rainbows and unicorns and being led by still waters to lie down in green pastures, but it hasn’t…as I’m guessing the last year and a half of anyone’s life hasn’t been. However it is life, and life serves one ultimate purpose… to lead us towards death. That’s not me being negative in the slightest. It’s just what happens. For every one began ends in death…#truestory. Well, except for Enoch and Elijah and Jesus.. but the odds of that happening to any of us… pretty slim.

And herein is why I’m writing again. It is who I am and what I do. I am a writer. It is my gift and I’ve done okay with it up to now on a very, very, very small scale… but I need to do more. “Feed My sheep” is how I believe He put it…and continues to put it. “Why do you call me Lord, Lord, yet don’t do what I say?” Yes, Lord…I will do what you say. Yet I’ve written very little here and almost none in the last three years, whereas I had been writing every day. Would I have liked to be writing as I had before? Yes. I have at least fifty ideas and/or topics to write about, and more opportunities arise daily… yet here I sit.

But this…ALL of this, the last five years have been a part of my journey…to get me to here. I’m okay with words, but am not overly eloquent. I don’t have a filter in real life, so I don’t see the need to have one here. But I will write to honor God and don’t believe He would want me to filter His words….or say anything that needs to be. And while I believe God has given me the words to say in previous blogs, I think He wants me to step up my game. He wants me to write from my heart.

I have named and renamed my blog a few different times over the years before settling on The Eyes of the Heart. Here are a few reasons why. One of my favorite authors, Frederick Buechner, who I will quote occasionally titled one of his books the same. And, of course, it led me to one of my favorite Bible verses, Ephesians 1:18-20.

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms…

“Know the hope to which He has called you” “His great power for us who believe” “…the same power that raised Christ from the dead”… I don’t know about you, but I want me some of that. “The riches of his glorious inheritance”… such a great chapter of the Bible. Such a great book in the Bible. All of the promises of God are for us.. on Earth as it is in Heaven.

So I write again. As I’ve said I was writing before, or dabbling in writing, but hadn’t quite hit on “eyes of the heart” writing. My Journey with God. I was only seeing with the eyes on my face…and if that is all I am capable of seeing with, I might as well be blind. If I was concentrating on writing fiction it may be different…I may have gotten away with it, as most of our fictional stories all have a bit of truth in them. That’s not good enough, though. My wants in writing have become to put on paper what God wants me to, so I’ll stick with non fiction…*Atheist opinions may vary. Guess that was a little off topic, but I have a way of making short stories long. 🙂

The hardest part I’ve found, so far, is cleaning out the gunk, cobwebs and debris from past hurts. I recently asked God to dig up (and heal) my heart as it has needed renovation and renewing for far too long. He came to heal the brokenhearted. There’s a lot of messiness there and so many things, scary things, things clowns that live in the sewer system are scared of I had stuffed down for so long and put to death…or so I thought. But as good of a God as He is.. as loving and compassionate as He is, He cannot and will not let us stay there. If you aren’t operating from the heart, you are among the walking dead. He is taking me back to the beginning to begin healing. He is not a half hearted God. He won’t stop at halfway, because halfway healed is still broken. He wants our true selves.. That isn’t to say He can’t use us otherwise, but He knows and loves us, but not the earthly versions of us we pretend to be. He wants the person He created before we were born. That is who He needs us to be. And thank Him for not quitting on us until we’ve become that person.

We all have a story of woundedness, yet if we don’t ever meet it head on and heal from it, we will most likely operate from that woundedness until we do. And so many people never do… I don’t want to be one of those people. My story isn’t unlike many, many others. A boy waits patiently for his father to come home when he’s two years old which becomes three which becomes five, then ten, then becomes he’ll never come for me, which becomes no one will ever come for me, and that’s where the boy learns to live out of. A girl waits her entire life time to hear her mother say “I love you” one time…. just one time, and that one time never comes and now her mother is no more, and she’s still waiting for words she’ll never hear. And that is where she learns to live out of. An area of pain, hurt and anger… and they both vow to never be in that position again.

So, eventually….once upon a time boy meets girl, they fall in love and they tell each other the words they never heard growing up…and they don’t know what to do with them, or how to process them, so they don’t. They part ways. They could be in each other’s arms in thirty minutes or less, but now they’re strangers. Once everything to each other…now they don’t talk. Hurt people hurt people.

Again, two stories that may not be any different from your own, and there are stories much more horrific than those. The parents who hurt us were once children of parents that wounded them. And most likely, intentionally or not, we have done the same to our children. Now would be a good time for a Bible verse… and I have nothing.

But then again, I do have something. I have everything. I have God and she does, too. That doesn’t mean there will be a happily ever after story between said boy and girl. The journey between them may be over…it may have just a chapter in the story of their journeys to God, but there will be a happily ever after story with God.

But it’s a process. It is always a process and we should always be a work in progress. And my progress is currently in digging up the past and healing. Until recently, I couldn’t tell you much of my life between two and twenty. But the parts I could tell weren’t any worth telling. Not sure if the second twenty something years would be any different. Smiling didn’t happen much and still doesn’t. Yes, I was a class clown and to this day enjoy making others laugh at work, at church, the check out line at the grocery story, at anywhere I go…I try to make others laugh even if I fight back tears while doing so. But I’m not content in staying there…..anymore. For a long time, I’ve been the man at the well. For probably longer than the 38 years it’s been said he was there. Soooo, I think it’s time to pick up my mat and walk…..but mostly talk/write. 🙂

Yet, that’s a scary thought. What are you supposed to do with your new found wellness? Unfortunately, we have curled up in our blankets of brokenness for so long, that we have made a home of it…and it’s not that bad there. Cozy, comfortable and every now and then the sun peeks in the great room between the blinds. It isn’t much, but it’s home…….or is it? Doesn’t look like life and to the full to me. So, everybody…. at the count of three, pick up your mat and walk.

Three.

Okay. Anyone there? Me either….but at least, I haven’t rolled my mat out again. I will continue writing and I will hit the publish button for the first time since July of last year. Hopefully, it’s a little more from the heart, or eyes of the heart and will continue to be. It can be a bit unnerving to hit the publish button without knowing what to expect. Will anyone read it? Does it make any sense? Does anyone care what my version of writing with the eyes of the heart truly is? Do they get it? Do they share the same thoughts? Are their wounds and pain too deep to uncover? Will we say a collective “what’s the use?” and keep trudging through what’s left of life? I hope not.

Hitting the publish button under any circumstances can be a daunting task, and it is with an odd mixture of pride, fear, humility, laughter, uncertainty, trepidation, etc and the underlying thought of “I hope I don’t scare them all away” as I move towards doing so. This is an attempt at seeing everything… you, me, the broken boy and girl, the homeless man pushing his overloaded cart towards the underpass to sleep on a cold night, the wealthy man cutting you off in his vehicle that cost more than your house with the eyes of my heart. We’ve all been wounded and scarred (and scared) at some point in our lives, and somehow find a way to live out of these places. Some with nothing. Some with everything (or so they think), because things are just things. They don’t make us complete. Only God can do that. There is an empty spot in all of us only He can fill. If only we would let Him.

Let Him. I’m kinda talking to you there, but talking to myself more. This is me and I hope some of you like it. This is who I am without the mask. I hope to write more from the heart, until I find myself no longer needing to wear one. God wants us as our true self and loves us enough to not let us remain behind the masks. He wants our tears, and sweat and snot and bloodied, bleary eyed and brokenness, the lost and long forgotten hopes and dreams, the absolute worse as in the vow, for better or worse, He wants us. So that He can heal us. Again, it’s life and to the full. He came to bind up the brokenhearted. Let Him…. see above. Kinda talking to myself again.

Back to the boy and girl story…still no happy ever after. It actually reminds me a little of Romeo and Juliet. No, we weren’t star crossed lovers, but were very good for each other. But the same things that brought us together were the same things that eventually tore us apart with all the unhealed damage we brought (from other people and our pasts) to our relationship. Heal! Get well! Don’t use your hurt to hurt others. There are resources available….and I don’t mean self-help. You can’t self help your way out of this. Find a Christian centered therapist, a friend, your pastor or a church worker that can steer you towards the right people. Try more than one, if nothing seems to be happening with the first or second or third one. Pray, pray and pray more. Turn to God. Open the door… for His sake, open the door!!

Back to Romeo and Juliet…..sort of. They ended up dying way too young and needlessly. I think. It’s Shakespeare. I only read it because I had to over 40’something years ago. YAWN!! Anyway, it was a tragic ending to their young lives. Dying once cannot be an easy thing to do, but I have to assume it’s better than dying every day for the rest of your life… Get well. It’s time we all learned to see with the eyes of our heart. It’s a beautiful, messed up world we live in. Rejoice and be glad in it. I say again, rejoice!

Prayer

Yay….. all we need in the world is someone else giving advice on how or what to pray. Just what the world needs right now. Then again, looking at the world right now, it may be exactly what is needed. I have no magic potion for prayer, but prayer isn’t magic. It’s way, waaaaaaay beyond magic. It is supernatural. It is miraculous. It is God at His very, very best…. and He’s always good. 🙂

I have found that Matthew 6 is a good place to start.

“But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.  And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.  Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” – Matthew 6:6-8

Find a quiet place… a quiet room, a mountaintop, a prayer closet, whatever works for you and shut out all distractions. Then open your heart to God. As the verse says, He knows what you need before you ask (but ask Him anyway) and He will reward you. What an awesome promise! Be honest and open without holding back. Strip away the facade. Set aside your masks…. all of them, and talk to God. Open up to God, take your limitations off of Him and what He can and will do for you… and then trust Him. In a with all your heart kind of trust. He already knows what you’re going to ask/say/pray… be honest with Him.

Believe He will do what He says He will do. We have heard and read the verses about asking, believing and receiving many times over to the point of them being committed to memory. But I feel where we fall short most likely is believing He will do them for us.

Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask… – 1 John 3:21-22a

And there it is… “If our hearts do not condemn us.” We’ve all been hurt by the world and betrayed by people we loved who promised always to be by our sides….. and they’re nowhere to be seen. We go into defense mode and employ whatever survival techniques to get by. We let our hearts condemn us. It’s a trick of the enemy. The battle is in our minds, but the fight is for our hearts. If he takes the heart out of the equation, he has won. Don’t let the enemy win. Your heart is where the Holy Spirit lives. Fight for your heart…. fight for Him. Open up to God in prayer, then turn Him loose.

Again, take your limitations off Him. Don’t start out your prayers with “God, I know I’m not worthy, but…” You are worthy. You are a child of God. Approach the throne with confidence.

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. – Hebrews 4:16

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. – 2 Timothy 1:7

Be bold with your prayers. Pray for yourself. Pray for others. Pray for the world before it blows up or we get swallowed whole by the giant Covid death clouds. 😉 Just pray. Pray without ceasing. Pray with thanksgiving. And pray believing a just, merciful and loving Father will answer your prayers in His will and His timing.

Awwww….. why’d I have to go and throw those last two in? Well…. because they’re true. Everything is in His timing and we (as in me) needs to let go of the wheel. But, but God…. I prayed this two minutes, two hours, two days, two weeks, two years ago. Where is the answer to my prayer? What’s taking so long?? Breathe… as in a trust in the Lord with all your heart kind of breath and hope it doesn’t take two decades. Some people wandered for forty years…some people are wandering still. Be still and know. Wait on the Lord. Take courage and wait on the Lord. 🙂 He knows the plans He has for you.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.  Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.  You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. – Jeremiah 29:11-13

Hmmm…. there’s that all your heart thingy again. It must be important to God. Your heart is important to God. Another reason why it’s important to trust in His timing and His will. Because sometimes the answers aren’t what you expected. Other times they are, but they look different than what you imagined. Sometimes your friend or family member’s healing you prayed so very hard for happened in heaven. Sometimes your friend or family members and the promises they made just walked away. Sometimes the job you had or business you started fell on tough times and you had to adapt and change the life you had envisioned.

Just know they are seasons and they won’t last. Also know that God’s love, mercy and grace will last, He will never leave you and that He keeps His promises…. although they may look a little different than what you thought. They also may take longer than you wanted to get there, but they will happen. Pray without ceasing. Praying with thanksgiving. And pray with hope knowing that God finishes what He has started… exceedingly and abundantly more than you could even begin to imagine in your wildest dreams. So sleep well tonight knowing God has it all under control and you are in His arms. Ask and receive, but most of all…. Believe. Believe (and trust) in the promises of God.

Write Something… Part 2

Aka. This One’s for Me

When I originally had the idea for this, I had three reasons to write about why I stopped writing almost two years ago. As of now, I can only think of two, but hope to remember the third before I hit the publish button.

I was posting more/most/all of my writing on facebook than I was here, although I have shared a few of them since on hope, forgiveness and trust. I was writing what I felt God was telling me to. I was writing on breaking strongholds, negative patterns and thinking, generational curses and learning to live and love life as God intended. Unfortunately and unwittingly I gave the enemy a stronghold to use against me. I was getting likes and positive comments. I was getting private messages about how my “Jeff talks” helped heal friendships, family relationships and people’s outlooks on life. And as a result I was becoming more hope filled also. As time went by, though, I began to add a disclaimer (sort of) that the things I wrote were merely my opinion. That I hoped they helped, but in a way attached an asterisk to them… and you don’t add an asterisk to God’s words. Again I was writing on breaking strongholds and gave the enemy a stronghold. Not my brightest moment as a fledgling, wannabe writer.

The second reason was something about a girl. When I started this endeavor in March 2016, it was called Letters to Shelly. The enemy mentioned above had torn Shelly and I apart in 2015, and we were completely broken by the beginning of 2016. But through lots and lots of prayer and even more grace given by God, Shelly and I were reunited by May of that year and she came home in June. We prayed. We listened. God guided our steps. He was ahead of us, behind us and more importantly next to us. We took a step of faith… then another and another. And it was good……for a while. But happily ever after, didn’t happen. After a few months she was mentally checked out of our story, and a few months later the rest of her left.

But that isn’t why I stopped writing. I was still writing. She and I were still talking and hanging out and having fun. Things weren’t great, but they were good…. and I still had hope. After all, it was a God story. All good, right? Not so much. When she came back we had made a promise we would share our God story with others. Soon after coming home, though, she asked to delay that for a month or two until she was settled and I agreed. Because of that though, she eventually became Eve and unfortunately, I was Adam. The enemy began to whisper to her and she began to believe him. And just like the original Adam, I sat by and watched….. and didn’t do a thing.

By now we were no longer a couple, but I still had hope. Again, the God story thingy. And then one day in conversation, she told me she never told anyone our story. I had told family and friends. I had the church praying for us. I told everyone who would listen about everything God had done for us and it was HUGE. God moved mountains to put Shelly and I together again. And she couldn’t tell one person. I saw God answer prayer after prayer after answered prayer. And she couldn’t tell anyone. How do you handle that? I had no idea then, and I have no idea now. I have no answers. I know it was a God story and God stories don’t usually end like that. It’s hard to take God out of His story, but somehow she did. I know God gave us free will and she used hers to walk away. I know God has His reasons and one day I will know, but for now I still don’t.

What I do know, though, is finding out one of the most Christian women I have ever known couldn’t include God in our story, caused the air to be taken from me and my hope to be taken from me and I stopped writing. Well, I’m writing again. I have hope again and I’m praying again…. although I never really stopped. But when you see prayer after prayer after prayer answered and they still choose to walk away, you wonder if they were ever answered….even though you know in your heart God answered them. << I sense a blog about this in the very near future. I began to think I prayed wrong, that I had misheard God…. but know I didn’t. It was a God story regardless of the outcome. He had His reasons, and one day I will know….. or I won’t. He’s God. He doesn’t have to tell me. 🙂

If you’ve made it this far, thank you. As I subtitled this one, This One’s for Me, it was. I still have faith in God. I believe more than I ever have, and I trust Him. Still working on the waiting, His will and timing stuff, and I may always be. I know He is never wrong, though, and that is why I can sleep at night knowing He loves me, cares for me, knows His plans for me, not to harm me, to give me hope and a future. And I can sleep knowing He’s there for Shelly too, wherever she may be and wherever she may go.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.  When you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.  You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” – Jeremiah 29:11-13

And there’s that ALL your heart thing again. I see a theme here… 🙂 I still have no idea what the third reason for not writing was, so maybe it wasn’t that big a thing. If I think of it I may update this, but will probably just let it go.. pretty sure it’s a God thing I don’t remember.