About My Heart

As tiresome as it can be to try and behave, I find myself ridiculously enamored with maintaining my own outward performances. You’d think by looking at my life at times that I’d never read the part where God says we pointlessly focus on our faces and mannerisms when He’s busy getting down into our hearts. Well, I have, and many times. I guess it’s just very, very, VERY easy to settle for a good performance review from my peers on planet earth.

Airport Fiasco

A case in point is a not-too-distant-past airport fiasco. I tried to get home from a speaking engagement in time to see my baby sister cross the finish line in her first marathon. And for some reason, I always like to cut it to the minute at airports. I blame this on my early childhood as a missionary kid and all those memories of us running (with all 20 carry-ons) to catch this plane and that. Back then, you could literally race from the curb to your seat on the plane almost non-stop.

Anyway, this particular day I had made it to third in line at the ticket counter, with 15 minutes until the baggage check-ins cut-off time. Frankly, I was quite amazed and relieved. George W. Bush was in town, and everyone was severely strict. Entering the airport itself had been tricky. But no hard feelings, I was going to make it this time with fifteen minutes to spare.

Then, right then and there, everything suddenly went into slow motion as I thought the above thoughts. All ticket agents left but one. Fourteen minutes… the one remaining came and went, ignoring us. Thirteen minutes… I was beginning to wonder if this was an intentional stall. Was there a bad person in our line they didn’t want on our plane? Ten minutes… nine minutes… I was just about as tweaked as everybody around me, and then I heard a voice.

Selfish Jerk

It was the high-heeled, Louis Vuitton-carrying, must-be-model in front of me. She had rushed the counter. “What the beep-a-de-beep-beep do you think you people are doing?” She screamed. “I must get on that plane, and you’re just standing here doing beep-a-de-beep nothing while the time for checking in is running out! Don’t you know how to check us the beep-a-de-beep-beep in?!”

I blushed. “What a selfish jerk,” I thought. “Can’t she control herself? She’s….,” but before I could even finish the thought, I heard a calm voice in my head, and I knew I was busted. It definitely had to be God because the person speaking knew my heart.

“Clar,” the voice purred, “take a good look at that woman because that’s actually you—yes, and you know it. She’s publicly hollering out what you are feeling in the privacy of your own heart.”

It’s About My Heart

Well, that was that. Yes, I missed my flight (and everything but the post-race spaghetti dinner), but more importantly, I was once again stripped of my perspective. Yes, it’s really not about my outward performance. Really. It’s about my heart.

And can you even imagine what life would be like if everything in our hearts were rolling across our foreheads on one of those obnoxious red flashing reader signs? For the record, if you cringe at the thought, you might be as much a performer as I. The good news is you’re not alone. The bad news is if you’re not interested in changing, you soon will be.

If you liked this, you might also enjoy What’s In Your Heart? |The Lord Looks at the Heart

Clarissa Worley Sproul writes from the Pacific Northwest.

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