Trust
Read the following:
The Paradoxical Commandments
by Dr. Kent M. Keith
People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.
Love them anyway.
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.
If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.
The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.
Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.
The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.
People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for a few underdogs anyway.
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.
People really need help but may attack you if you do help them.
Help people anyway.
Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you have anyway.
© Copyright Kent M. Keith 1968, renewed 2001
I don't know how to live like that without people to remind me that I have those things in me. How do you know when you need to be these things spoken of above, or when you need to "protect your heart"? It is really hard to live in mis-trust and still live from the center of your heart. I think it is impossible. I imagine (as my original hunch was all along) that when I am admonished to "protect your heart" it is so that I will eventually realize it is an impossible task. I cannot protect my heart to the measure that it needs protection.Only the one who created the heart knows how to protect it.
posted by alethea at 9:17 PM
2 Comments:
I think when I try to "protect my heart" I end up hiding my heart from myself, Jesus and the world. We are told to guard our hearts in Proverbs, but I think I turned that into permission to protect myself instead of being open and vulnerable. I am slowly, oh so slowly, learning to be honest. It's been a strange, strange journey!
So - what does it mean to guard our hearts? I know that we shouldn't build up protective walls, but what should we do? I think I made a decision recently that guarded my heart and at the same time left me completely vulnerable. Not fun. But I'm so glad I did. Perhaps guarding my heart is connected to obedience. There was a large part of my decision that was obedience. I knew that God had certain steps for me. I've taken the ones I can see right now and I'm trusting him for the rest of the journey. And anyway - Jesus is a blessing and a wellspring of joy. (Not circumstantial happines, but true joy.)
10:40 PM
Thanks for your comments "anonymous." Any chance you would let me know who you are?
8:41 PM
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