Today's sermon at church was from Ecclesiastes 4:1-12. The part of this scripture that I like best is "Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him .... a threefold cord is not quickly broken." {Ecclesiastes 4:9-12.} This sermon was very difficult for me because it really struck a nerve. I'm certain that God intended for me to hear this, I'm just not sure exactly what He wanted me to learn from it. It's true, I agree, two ARE better than one .... I just wish I had learned all of this a LONG time ago. There are certain relationships in my life that I have a lot of regrets about. Maybe if I had committed my life to the Lord BEFORE these relationships then I would have known that the bible says to lead our hearts, not to follow our hearts. In the book "The Love Dare" it says that the heart is the center of our being, where the "real you" resides, the starting place of all of our thoughts, beliefs, values, motives, & convictions. It says in Proverbs 27:19 "As water reflects a face, so a man's heart reflects the man". Boy, that scripture really makes me realize how selfish & completely unloving I have been in past relationships. The thought that my words & actions then, {things I may have claimed were coming from my heart}, were a reflection of ME makes me realize that regret is not a strong enough word. In the past I was FOLLOWING my heart instead of LEADING my heart. In other words, I was following all the romantic notions that love songs, love stories, etc., tell us; just going along with my feelings & emotions at the time. When you follow your heart you're chasing after whatever feels right at the moment instead of what is actually right. Feelings & emotions are fickle & unreliable & can change according to the circumstances. It also says in "The Love Dare" that our hearts are basically selfish & sinful, and that "unless our hearts are genuinely changed by God, they will continue to choose wrong things". I think that statement right there will be my new ..... I don't know ..... my new "life statement", or "relationship statement", I guess. What I mean is, this will be my reminder that I need to LEAD MY HEART from now on, because that is the only way that my future relationships will succeed. And to be perfectly honest, I don't want to spend the rest of my life alone. I believe that "two are better than one", and I hope someday to find my "better half" & work hard to make our relationship a COVENANT instead of a contract. {Contracts can be broken, but a covenant is a verbal commitment based on trust, assuring someone that your promise is unconditional & good for life, spoken before God out of love for another}. I pray that when I do find a man to spend my life with, that we will BOTH commit to LEAD OUR HEARTS & commit our relationship to God.
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