For Your Heart, Right Now

I’m making this issue of my newsletter public, as I pray it will serve any who read it. If you want to subscribe, scroll to the end of this article. You’ll receive a link and password to access back issues.

What an interesting week it’s been. I woke up Saturday morning unsure of how to process it all because of how weird it all feels.

As I lay in bed earlier tonight trying to fall asleep, a memory was jogged (so here I am telling you about it!). Though details of the day are fuzzy, I still remember sitting in chapel my junior year of college when I saw a note passed to the President of our college as he spoke. After reading the note, he made the announcement that an airplane had just flown into the Pentagon.

It was September 11, 2001.

I went back to my dorm room and turned on the TV. I remember watching at least one of the planes hit one of the Twin Towers. I tried calling home repeatedly, but received nothing but a busy signal. My college was in Tennessee, but I was from Maryland. And my dad often worked downtown in DC. “Was he working downtown today?”

A little later that morning, I was in another dorm lobby with a group of underclassmen around me. They were asking all sorts of questions, and while I don’t remember what I said, I remember speaking of the Lord. It was a strange moment, as I realized that they were looking to me, though I wasn’t much older than them.

I gave them all that I knew to give them. Jesus. He was the anchor of my heart, and I knew that He needed to be theirs.

I still hadn’t heard anything from my family.

We’re living through a unique time in history in which every single one of us is sharing in the same life event. Not one of us is exempt! Though we might each be affected in different ways, it’s a pretty remarkable reality.

And, just like on 9/11, we all need the same thing: Jesus.

So, I find myself in the same place again nearly 20 years later, offering all that I know to offer—Him.

In addition to the US, some of you are in Canada, Italy, Singapore, Austria, Norway, Slovakia, Montenegro, and the UK. Each of these countries has been affected, and in varying degrees.

How are you doing? I’d really like to know. How can I pray for you? How can we pray for you?

I wonder how you’ve been processing all that’s occurring around the world right now regarding the Corona Virus? I wonder how you’ve personally been affected?

Our family has felt the effects to a small degree. Our church meets in a school, so our typical Sunday gathering looked different this week. My husband is a small business owner, and while he hasn’t felt the effects yet, he likely will soon. We home school, but all of the local schools are closed until at least April, and my husband and I have both had upcoming events cancelled that were scheduled into April.

I did buy toilet paper last weekend at Costco when I legitimately needed some, and didn’t have an inkling that by the end of the week store shelves would be empty.

But tonight, as I type this, I find myself a little shaky. These are very uncertain times. I have questions that have no answers yet. Earlier, I realized that over the weekend, I’ve asked my husband the same question multiple times, just in a different way. I noticed I was biting the inside of my lip. The Lord helped me to see anxiety creeping in.

It seems fitting that in the last two newsletters, we’ve been considering self-awareness, especially as it relates to loving others, because now is a great time to practice it.

Each of us are thinking different thoughts, experiencing different feelings, and have varying responses to the current situation. And they each influence how we relate to others. They really do.

Right now, we have both an invitation to know the Lord more deeply and an opportunity to lead others to Him. And I strongly suspect there will continue to be opportunity in the future season when all of this is behind us.

But how we steward these opportunities now, and in the future, will hinge on how we steward the invitation being offered to our own hearts, first. Do we see this season as an opportunity to know the Lord more?

One way to tangibly love one another in this time is to be aware of what’s happening in our hearts and minds, and to pay attention to what’s coming out of us. What are we consuming through our eyes and our ears? And how is it affecting us? Is it dulling our heart before the Lord? Or is it pushing us to compassionately, sacrificially serve others?

I know that most of us have kids home with us for several weeks now, and it may seem harder to get a few minutes alone with the Lord. But I really want to encourage you that now more than ever it needs to be a priority. Not only is there uncertainty about us, but as much as we all love our kids, having them with us 24/7 will require even more of us.

We need the Lord!

I mentioned last month that I hoped to have a printable ready for you to help guide you in this journey of whole self-awareness. I’ve prayerfully worked on it, and it’s available here, in a PDF file. I hope you’ll find it helpful. Now is an opportune time to start paying attention to your heart, mind, and body if you haven’t already.

Included with the PDF are instructions. Sister, I made this with you in mind, but it is out of my own journey that it was born. When it became like second nature, the Lord helped me to see that I had something to offer someone else. I do pray it helps you in this season. Please pass it on to someone else if you think it will serve them.