Monday, September 19, 2011

A Woman's Heart Part Two: Abandonment



"Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her." Hosea 2:14

I can guarantee there were two types of reactions to Part One: Beauty to Be Unveiled. Either you started to truly believe that you are beautiful or you allowed yourself to simply nod, smile, and let it last for a few minutes. The next day you either arose with a peaceful sigh, thanking the Lord for creating you absolutely breathtaking in sight or you hide your beauty behind what walls have existed for years and guarded your heart.

You made a decision after you read that post. You either took the words to heart or you filed them away for another time, another time when you might feel strong enough to deal with them.

The fact of the matter is that I can tell you how uniquely divine each of you ladies are, but until your heart accepts my words. . . no, HIS words, it will not change lifestyles and beliefs. The Lord delights in your beauty, in His creation, beyond what we can fathom.

Yet, our hearts are absolutely and positively prone to hide, to deny, and to allow suffering to take place where none is needed. You can believe or not believe what I say, but what God says is. . . you don’t have to be alone.

That is our greatest fear, right? As women, we thirst for and thrive in companionship. We long to share our hearts, not live in seclusion. But few seem interested now-a-days. Few seem to delight in our hearts. Instead, we are told lines such as these:
“I could never understand women!”

“Women are just too deep, too fast. They are not worth the effort.”
And it hurts. Just say it. It hurts more than words can express. When we begin feeling and believing the lies of this culture, the perceptions of our peers, we retract. We shelter. We try to find and control our lives when God calls us to lose our live in order to find life.

We seek to control our lives through any means necessary, through believing and eventually speaking the lies of this culture to our hearts. We feel ashamed of our beauty. We feel ashamed of our love. We feel ashamed of our vulnerability. We feel ashamed of our desires. We feel ashamed to be women.

Many wonder why the feminist movement came about and rose up with such ferocity. Women wanted to feel comforted by company, by the joining of hands, but they also wanted to answer a very deep and complex question: Do I matter?

The volumes of the world seemed to speak that men mattered; the pride of the male race attracted attention. The feminist movement, unlike some believe, was not a new notion so much as it was a unspoken notion finally proclaimed and given the attention of the world. It became a way for women to feel like they mattered and to feel like they were not abandoned or forgotten.

Ironically, it only led to tired and frustrated grandmothers, mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters. These women were not only exhausted as a result of having found their search for answers to be just as difficult, but now they added a new can of worms to the mix: they needed to control everything involving men's expertise as well as their own.

The need to control is not a new desire in women. Men experience the same need to control, but often in different forms. Because women were naturally born with the tendency and desire to be vulnerable and to be protected and nurtured by their husbands, women seek to control their hearts, emotions, and feelings. Sometimes things just get beyond control and other times you meet women whose hearts seem held in a vise-like grip that will not only refuse to resolve, but to also punish those who dare to draw near.

Mistrust is deeply seeded in our hearts; it started way back when Satan tempted Eve. Eve felt that she was not being given all that she needed, that God was holding out on her. From the moment she believed that mistrust, the daughters of Eve inherited it.

Our culture and men feed the mistrust even more. Culture tells us one thing and then destroys our hopes with even higher expectations. Men draw away from women before they get too close and personal, not wanting to tap into their own fears in order to begin to not only aid and protect but also understand women.

It lives and breathes at the heart of men and women alike: a fear that breathes from Satan himself. It causes men to hold back and to abandon, for they deeply fear failure. It causes women to draw in and close up, for they deeply fear abandonment and misuse.

You want to know something? I live and breathe that fear every single day of my life. I know I do. And I know you do too. We may try to hide it, call it different names, cover it up. . . whatever the case may be, but it’s there.

It haunts us; you and me.

And not only does my heart break thinking about it, but the Lord’s heart breaks even more. He made you beautiful for your vulnerability. He made you precious in your graciousness and loving spirits. He made you divine in your endless desire to serve others, to be a part of all the great adventures of life.

When Eve took the apple at the Fall and believed Satan’s lies, the Lord knew the heart of Eve in that moment; He knew the mistrust that dwelt there; the fear.

And He had to save us. He had to save women. Those longings we feel, those deep, fearful, tearful, painful longings to matter, to be loved, to never be forsaken were placed in our hearts many years ago so that we might see the Lord as our ultimate source of comfort. He knew only His heart could comfort us and give us the grace and love we needed.

Our fears exist so that we may know the truth of His promise: that those who seek Him shall find life. But those who seek their own life shall lose it.

Your hearts, our hearts, are too precious, to breath-taking to keep locked away behind walls, imprisoned and beaten by lies. We are not called to take our fear of abandonment, our desire to matter, and to use them as chains.

Christ is knocking at the door. He’s knocking at the door to your heart. He wants to restore and nurture vulnerability, purity, tenderness, vibrant spirit, dazzlingly starlight, glistening hope, loving fellowship. He wants to restore it all. The question is. . . will you let Him?

Read Part Three: Hero Versus Villain

2 comments:

  1. This post spoke directly to my heart (particularly paragraphs 8-9). Thank for this, dearest!

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  2. This may or may not have caused me to start bawling. Thanks, Hannah, for your timely words.

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