My heart is an idol factory and needs an emergency shut-off switch

By a Mars Hill woman

If I had to sell the junk my heart has been producing this week, I would be bankrupt and starving.  No matter how prettily I package it, how cleverly I market it, or how cheap the price, no one would want it.

For those of you that read my last post, My Family, My Idol, you read about the turbulent time I’ve been having since confronting my family about past sin.  Going into those conversations, my heart was soft and God had brought me to a place of repentance and a genuine desire to speak His truth, offer grace and forgiveness to my family, and seek reconciliation.  The past few months, however, of sitting in the mess of disappointment, re-wounding, and broken relationship has taken a toll on my heart.

I thought I was prepared for whatever response and outcome that God had planned for my family.  And although I believe my heart was pure leading up to the conversations, it has hardened in the aftermath of my family’s response, which was nothing close to what I had hoped for.  I wanted my family to experience what grace means and to accept my forgiveness.  I wanted them to grieve over what happened and take responsibility for their part.  And most of all, I wanted them to come to know and love Jesus.

None of that has happened and this week God revealed to me that my initial grace and forgiveness was not offered with God’s heart.  I found myself taking it back and turning away in anger and pride.  My desire for reconciliation and justice (as I have defined them) has taken precedence over everything else.  Not only am I still struggling with the idol of worshipping my family by wanting “peace” at all costs, but I have also added the idol of a need for reconciliation on my terms.

The ugliness of my heart runs deep.  After months of my forgiveness getting thrown back in my face, the conversations in the darkest places of my heart went something like this.  “I’m offering grace, dammit.  Take my freakin’ forgiveness.  Screw that!  Why should I be vulnerable in relationships when I’m just going to get hurt?  Why give up control when I seem to manage just fine on my own?”

It’s ugly, I know.

But God put a mirror to my face today and showed me something that broke my heart.  He has offered grace and forgiveness to me over and over, and done so without expecting me to respond perfectly.  When I cling to my old identity of a dirty and defiled little girl and turn my head at the identity I have in Jesus, I am refusing His gift of grace and forgiveness.  No matter how many times I throw it back in His face in refusal, He remains gentle, patient and loving.  He won’t change His mind or base His offer on what I say or do.  Jesus has already paid the price and the gift of grace is right there for me to accept.

The beauty is that God’s love is not conditional; it is not dependent on what we do or don’t do.  Nor is it even unconditional in the sense that He allows us to be and act as we please.  Through recent teachings I have come to embrace the idea that God’s love is actually “contra-conditional”.  He has called us on His terms.  While we were still enemies, He died for us and set about the work of winning and transforming our hearts so that we would become like Him.  God’s irresistible grace and transforming love is far greater than unconditional love.

I know it’s good and right to hope for the salvation and sanctification of my family and to not be content with their unrepentant hearts.  But I am not trusting in God’s plan for what He has envisioned that to look like.  I have placed conditions around it and have secretly demanded it be on my terms; my agenda over His, my timing over His.

Please Lord, soften my heart and teach me to suffer well.  I don’t want to keep turning my back on You.  I don’t want to seek out cheap and empty replacements for Your great comfort and hope.  I want to run to You and keep running to You no matter how hard it gets, how painful it is, and how unsafe I feel.  When I am overwhelmed with disappointment or feel out of control, I want to respond with Your love.   And I am only able to love because You first loved me.  And that should be enough.  I want that to be enough for me.

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when His glory is revealed.  (1Peter 4:12-13)