not the 4h but the 3h...

I read an article about our hearts the other day that made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. Scientists and doctors are exploring the construction of our hearts and finding they are mini brains... wired, connected, not just a big muscle. Maybe heart transplant patients who report a change in their being after the surgery are right. There is more to our hearts than being pumps for blood.
The concordance in my Bible has a full page, in tiny type, listing references to the heart. The old ones’ wisdom may not have been based on scientific knowledge but it was a different kind of knowing that was equally accurate. I suspect the intuitive wisdom about the heart crosses all boundary lines of time, culture, religion and geography.
Since my reference point for understanding God is Jesus, I looked at what he had to say about the heart... "Blessed are the pure in heart; Where your treasure is, there will be your heart also; to the paralyzed man, ‘Take heart and walk’; Take heart, it is I; have no fear; Let not your heart be troubled." Now I know as a New Testament student who has been taught by Frank Stagg, that many of these statements are not actual quotes. That doesn’t bother me. The wisdom in the words is more important than the assurance of the accuracy of the words. One quote however stands out to me and I choose to take it literally. When questioned about the greatest commandment, Jesus replied, " The Lord our God is one ; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this; You shall love your neighbor as yourself". In two sentences all of the gospel that is necessary is summed up in order.
God is one... an affirmation echoed by our Jewish and Muslim brothers and sisters. Love God with all your heart comes first, not by accident but by design. Our hearts, wired for love, are the beginning source for all our yearning and reaching and searching for the One who first loved us. Our soul, the creation that carries our truest selves, is second in line with our minds and strength at the end of the list. As a child with an evangelical family tree, my Baptist mothers and fathers may have been right to have a healthy distrust for education that separated heart, soul and mind. My mind is necessary as I love God not because my mind can understand or imagine the fullness of God, but because using my mind can stretch my soul and deepen my love for God. An uninformed or unformed mind can be a hindrance to the heart, but it is no substitute for the heart and soul. And here is the problem.
We have elevated the mind and its way of knowing in our lives to first place. Our children must make A’s, go to the best colleges, have careers not jobs. We must know about environmental issues, racial divides, wars and rumors of wars so that we might act in accordance with God’s call to love our neighbors as ourselves. Knowledge is seen as the agent of change and the mind as the source for our strength. That is not true for me. My knowledge will always be imperfect and my mind will never equal the mind of God. For me, the starting place for all change, is in right relationship with God. All else in my life flows from this stream head. If I am praying, listening, waiting on God and my soul is resting in the assurance I am loved, my mind can be engaged, gain knowledge and act in strength that comes from my Source, a different way of knowing. I say this well aware of my own predisposition to intuition and feeling. The Meyers Briggs Type Indicator gives a clear picture of my preferred functioning style. I know my way of perceiving is not the only way and my way of finding God is not the only way. Nevertheless, the way of the heart, soul, mind and strength, all beginning in the Heart of God, all a seamless free play that connects us to each other, a way of knowing our hearts that lets us know the hearts of others, not either or but both and, an integrated whole soul, will set us all free... hearts hardwired to love, heads to learn and hands to serve...a Christian 3 H...Thanks be to God for my whole self.

if i could talk to the animals... and God

My daddy spoke cow and my mama spoke cat and dog. Hugh Lofting’s character, Doctor Doolittle, was one of my childhood heros. Growing up on a farm allowed me to spend hours with all sorts of animals. I can speak cow, cat and dog fairly well but chicken and pig were more difficult to master. I am surrounded by friends and family who speak animal. Lisa, my friend and neighbor, speaks dog fluently. She suspects she may have been in the wrong line when souls were being handed out. My daughter Alison speaks dog, cat, and rabbit. Our farm partner and friend, Tim, speaks toad, hornet and butterfly. My friend Elizabeth can communicate with all animals. In order to speak a language, any language, you must listen with your heart. Most of us just listen with our ears.
At my church I am also surrounded by many different languages. Some of us speak Baptist, others Catholic, Presbyterian and Methodist. Some Church of God and other evangelical tongues blend with Congregational and Evangelical Reformed voices. All our voices have different accents, different emphases on a shared belief language. It can get pretty confusing and frustrating at times especially when we do not listen with our hearts. All of us have sound tracks that loop continuously as we listen to the voices of others. The trick to learning any language, even the language of the Holy, is to turn that loop off and listen not with our minds, not with our mouths set to respond, not with our ideas, but with our hearts.
I have been fascinated with the art of communication in spite of language lately. Celeste is driving Moldovan friends who do not speak English well to Charlotte for medical treatment. Their sharing is rich and vibrant heart to heart language that supercedes words. Emma Clair holds a horse’s head gently in her hands and they understand each other’s love. Tina tells me of her belief that she is being healed of her kidney disease because she believes the touch of evangelist Ernest Ainsley has special powers. Another friend, highly intuitive, has a special gift for feeling the feelings of others. Sometimes I wonder if speaking/talking/preaching/teaching gets in the way of our truly knowing one another.
What would worship be like if the preacher spoke heart language for five minutes, sat down and gave the congregation time to respond from their hearts? What would a visit to the doctor be like if the doctor, after giving the medical facts, spoke heart language and then listened for the patient’s response? How would our work change if we spoke heart language? How would we change if we spoke heart language?
Prayer is for me the heart language that I use to speak to God. I was always confused as a child by the notion the God knew what was in my heart already so why did I have to pray? Now I know why. God may know, but often I do not know what is in my heart until I offer my open heart to the Presence in prayer, the language God can speak with anyone. This kind of prayer is not limited by a belief system or proper language or special gifts or calling. It is one to one communing with the Love that called us into creation, that will sustain us if we but listen and speak with our hearts as we travel through our lives. This kind of communication with God and others brings the gifts of the Spirit..."But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control..." Galatians 6:22
Today I will speak heart language, be a praying animal, and pray for the fruits of the Spirit.

night weeping and morning joy

We woke in the night to the sound of Annabelle weeping in the woods. Her mournful cries echoed in the night darkness as she sought her baby boy. Michael found Annabelle lying beside her dead baby in the high pasture yesterday morning. When the baby was born, she didn’t get the membrane covering his face removed quickly enough so he was unable to breathe. It was a sad start to the month of October. Once again my annual journey through this glorious month begins with death.
October, my death anniversary month, has taught me a great deal about prayer. This is the time I remember and grieve the deaths of my sister, my first husband and my father. With the passage of time certain rituals have developed that honor our lives together and apart. The fresh, raw, sharp, stabbing pain of new grief called out to God in anguished, abbreviated, often wordless prayers has eased now. The quickening of grief pain comes still but the edges are rounded, softened by gratitude for the presence of these beloved ones in my life then and now. After sixty years, the pattern of loss and grief has been woven into the fabric of my daily life. It enriches and gives texture to my joy. This could not have come to be without prayer.
The times that try your soul will call forth prayer in honesty and anger and grief and love and suffering and joy. Joy is the unlikely companion in this prayer journey but as necessary for me as the grief. Always we live in paradox... life and death... tears and laughter... hope and despair... love and hate... and prayer is the one way I have to pour this all out to God and ask the questions for which there are no answers. My answers have come not as one bright shining revelation on a road to Damascus but accumulated over the years through God showing up in the ones who surround me.
When Tim died, Mary Lynn, Walt and Ida held me close, being the answers to my prayers. When Gayle died, new sisters of choice wrapped their arms around me while I wept. When daddy died, neighbors and family sat and cried and laughed together as we told stories about our life with daddy. The old hymn, "How Firm a Foundation", says it well. "When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie, My Grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply; The flame shall not hurt thee- I only design thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine".
Annabelle was surrounded by her herd this morning as she wept at the birthplace of her baby boy. I am surrounded by my herd who are the faces of God for me, the arms of God for me, the answers to my prayers. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning. Psalms 30:5b Today I give thanks for weeping and laughter, for all the answers to prayer I have been given, for prayer that gives me a connection to the One who cares for me all the days of my life. I am blessed.