Heart-Speak

When your mind speaks, listen. Rational, logical thinking is very important. Make sure you understand before you act. Calculate, do not estimate.

When your heart speaks, take good notes. That bit of advice appears on the front of…guess what…a notebook. Good notes, because you’ll probably be going back to the heart wisdom when reason and logic come up short. My mind says: Do this because it is efficient, practical and productive. My heart tells me: Do this because it’s the right thing to do; or don’t because it’s wrong. Not mathematically wrong, but morally wrong or ethically wrong.

Listening to “heart-speak” means you might go against the tide of public opinion, might take a position on some important subject that carries the price tag of popularity or personal advancement. In some rare cases, might put you in personal jeopardy.

This kind of “heart-speak life” might remind you of someone long ago who dared to live by different criteria, and you know what happened to him. Death? No, I’m talking about an empty tomb. Just as we can’t hold back the dawn, so the ways of the heart are intuitively and instinctively right. So, when your heart speaks, take good notes. But remember that the value in living this “heart-speak” way is not how many notebooks you accumulate.

Do you ever get tired of pastors and priests reminding you, week after week, to lead with your heart because that’s the way Jesus did it? Me, too. So let’s just do it.