“Just follow your heart.”
If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it a thousand times. You can’t watch a Hallmark movie or Great American Family without hearing it. You can’t read a self-help book (I will leave them unnamed since I don’t want to publicize them) without hearing that phrase. You can’t go to a high school or college graduation without hearing those words somewhere in the speech. Without a doubt it may be one of the most popular phrases used in our culture.
Last night in my group I call Wednesday Night Conversations, we discussed this phrase. I shared some statistics with them that I thought were quite telling:
- 84% of Americans believe that the “highest goal in life is to enjoy it as much as possible.”
- 86% believe that to be fulfilled requires you to “pursue the things you desire most.”
- 91% affirm that “the best way to find yourself is by looking within yourself.”
(Source: “Don’t Follow Your Heart by Thaddeus Williams-p.xiv)
But, in reality, following your heart is a really bad idea. To follow your heart implies that you take it as seriously as the Christian takes the Bible, the Muslim takes the Koran, or some cult follows its rule book/leader. You must redefine your identity and anything less than full obedience and expression of every subjective feeling of sexual attraction is unforgivable. Anyone who questions you is a bigot, a phobic, a hater, or worse, an “R.” Our ancestors got a lot wrong, like us. But the one thing they got right was that feelings were not the final authority of right and wrong. Why? Simple. Feelings cannot be trusted. You wake up one morning and you feel absolutely great. Your day goes well. You wake up the next morning with a headache to beat all headaches and you didn’t sleep very well. You day goes terribly. What was the difference? How. you. felt. The fallacy in all of this, the unalterable truth the “follower your heart-ers” want us to think, is that deep down we are all basically good. Aaaah yeah. I know myself. I know I rationalize, make excuses, point the finger of blame, and tend to dismiss criticism.
Word to the wise: don’t follow your heart. It is deceptive and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). Instead, we need to align ourselves with God’s Word, whether it goes against our grain or not. The TRUTH is not up for grabs or auction. We need to pray that God will give us a new heart (Jer. 24:7), one that will follow His lead and not our own.
