"several months ago I read an intriguing article at True U. In "Guarding Your Heart … From What?" Lindy Keffer talks about the mistake of guarding one's heart against the wrong thing.
She writes:When we talk about guarding our hearts, we usually mean being super careful about how much personal stuff we disclose to someone in whom we're romantically interested. We think of it as a way to save our emotional intimacy for our future spouses. There's only one problem with this idea. It's not actually biblical. The phrase "guard your heart" comes from Proverbs 4:23. Read in context, it's clearly talking about guarding our hearts against sin, not people.
This was new information to me. As someone who grew up in the church, I had this verse drilled into me as a caution against emotional intimacy with the opposite sex (not a bad idea in high school). Guarding myself from potential heartbreak became my guiding principle -- an indicator that I was "doing things right" in my relationships with the opposite sex. I now see that I also hid behind it to avoid being hurt.
Lindy goes beneath the surface:For those of us who once felt safe and justified living within the Christian dating box, the demands of righteousness can come as a shock. Suddenly, it's not about checking all the boxes on the list, but about being intimately attuned to the Holy Spirit, even as we are growing closer to another person.
Using the prophet Hosea as an example, Lindy points out that not all romances have happy endings. I think this is the hardest part about dating and marriage. In order to get to the point of making a lifelong commitment to love someone, we must open ourselves up to (at least one) sinful person who will hurt us. Somehow, I think we've taken the Christian relationship books to mean that if we follow all the steps, we can avoid the hurt, but it just isn't so.
And yet there is something of spiritual value in the process. When we make the focus guarding our hearts against sin, not people, we risk being hurt. But when you consider the many ways God can be glorified in righteous vulnerability, it is a risk worth taking."
That's really good. It always is most beneficial when we look at Scripture and understand it in its context. Thanks for posting this. I think a lot of young woman especially have this all mixed up and could really use some guidance into what's really the case, so that their hearts can find peace in the One who gives peace.
ReplyDeleteya i found it on a website and so i decided to post it cause it helped me understand it better as well!
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