Secrets of the Heart

The human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed

- Charlotte Bronte

This quote came to my mind out of the blue today. I first came across it more than 12 years ago when I was doing literature at ‘A’ Levels, then again many many years later in the movie “Definitely Maybe”.

Maybe it’s something I told Caleb last night, coupled with something Weixiu said as well. I’m a lot quicker to peg people now, and I was telling Caleb of someone that I’ve lost touch with because I think I’ve figured that person out, and decided that it serves no purpose to indulge him/her by “catching up”. It made me wonder about the time when I would spend hours and hours with a friend, trying to know him or her better, and working on that friendship. Weixiu mentioned last night that its getting harder and harder now to make new friends, and I replied that I took a lot of joy in being invisible when I visited CEFC Woodlands on Sunday.

What’s the link?

I think mystery always appeals to people. As Charlotte Bronte said, in the context of the human heart, there is a certain attraction to that which is mysterious and unknown. Ravi Zacharias once said that this world is too eager to “figure everything out”, thus making us lose our sense of wonder. The wonders and beauty of nature can be broken down into a textbook that “wearies the body” (Eccelsiastes 12:12), instead of refreshing the soul by the sheer wonder of it all, amplified by its mystery.

Then I think about the broad spectrum of relationships that I’ve seen around me, and the two extremes of the relationships that I’ve been in – One where we walked away recognizing that we barely knew each other, and the other now where we might run into the danger of knowing each other too well! (You know, since they say that familiarity breeds contempt.)

I think the hunger to know is good. If we were content to let God remain a mystery and not seek Him out, we would be so much poorer for it today. If he had not discovered electricity, mankind would not have been be able to enjoy ESSENTIAL comforts such as air-conditioning today (Bless your soul, Benjamin Franklin).

HOWEVER, too much of a good thing can be bad. I speak for myself here. Sometimes, after knowing a person for a long time, I’m too quick to assume that I’ve figured him out, and automatically peg him in a certain way. In Bronte’s words, its as if his charms have been broken. All because I think I’ve unlocked the secrets in his human heart.

Now, this post is probably a follow-up to my Easter post on reconciliation. An after-shock, if you’ll pardon the earthquake analogy. Maybe I need to “un-peg” my friends. Especially the ones I’m angry and not ok with. Maybe I need to once more recognize that, being made in the image of God, there’s still a lot of mystery left in everyone. A lot of potential for good, if I could but see it. Last year at Easter, I posted a song called Mercy Saw Me. Its chorus summed it up perfectly: “Beautiful – That’s how Mercy saw me”.

But its really hard work. Its hard to look at someone and not let all the past experiences shape our response to him/her. Hard to love someone and see someone the way Mercy does. So much easier to rely on my own experience and put up walls and barriers. It’ll DEFINITELY save time, and DEFINITELY save us from disappointments. It might even save us from looking stupid for having tried… and at 30 years old, its VERY VERY hard to not let disappointments and weariness eat at you… but I guess that’s why the Bible keeps reminding us we don’t do it by our own strength.

Lord, teach me to delight in the secrets of the human heart. In its secrets kept and its silences sealed. The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams and the pleasures that each one has. And break not those charms whenever they’re revealed.