TOTHEUNTAMEDHEART.

You know those little animals that you can rent at the mall for ten minutes at a time, riding them along to the loud music that’s squeezed out of their very fluffy being? The obnoxious ones that you can’t help but stare at as they dodge past you, stealing all your train of thought, ending all sentences mid way?

I did it. This girl who hates any eyes on her braved up and took one for the team, red face and all. Every time we pass those animals all lined up calmly waiting for the next fun having mall goer, I think to myself ‘I couldn’t ever’ while Luca thinks to himself ‘if I could only’. So, folks. I rode that adventurous pig and it was everything I had thought it would be and more. Everything I expected it would be means it was just as horrific and humiliating as I thought, while the ‘more’ part held an equal amount of unshakeable joy. I have come to find you cannot hold a grudge and ride a music playing stuffed animal around the mall. All things are possible through God, except maybe that.

I have always visualized myself as someone who truly doesn’t care what anyone thinks and here is what I am coming to know.

When in places of our peak vulnerability, we will always have to get past caring. When we don’t enter nor allow anyone else to enter or show up once a month to our places of vulnerability, that wall still stands tall.

One time I went to this college campus and during worship I just let it rip. Which is probably the most accurate description of what it sounds like when I sing in general, let alone sing loudly. But in my mind, I sat there and thought, what if we all worshipped in our absolute A game, not holding back because of what others would think? What if we all gave our judgements a rest & gave God those parts of our hearts, too?

I am not going to tell you that the girl I went with wasn’t embarrassed to be associated with me, nor am I trying to convince you the whole row of college kids behind me weren’t hysterically laughing coincidentally while I sang loud to God. But I can tell you when I made up my mind one hundred percent to devote that moment to God and worship Him to the fullest, I didn’t care about my peers. I only felt sorry that they couldn’t let go of something so superficial to reach the heart.

Also, I never regretted it nor held it up to the light to wonder if I should.

“Blessed are those who don’t feel guilty for doing something they have decided is right.”
(Romans 14:22)

In a world where we second guess our mismatched socks, our baby’s lack of socks, and what people might think. In a world where we go over everything we did when we approached that person and everything we handled wrong in the moment and all the words we wonder if we should’ve cut short. Blessed are those who don’t feel guilty for doing something they have decided is right.

Blessed are the people who don’t look around at what everyone else thinks of them and what they do. Blessed are the people who have their eyes on God as their judge and God alone. Blessed are the people who dance in the front of the church for their God. Blessed are the people with bad singing voices that sing loudly any way.

So I rode the pig and I sang loudly, and I intend to dance silly and laugh when I trip over my own feet and cry when things move me in the middle of a crowd. I plan on praying more and emotionally and raising my hands while doing so. And I think you should get wild, too. Go to Walmart in your hole covered pajamas and check the people of Walmart website later to see if you made the cut. Do the things you love to do that you are awful at and do them loudly.

Lets live blessed and live to give God our all and learn to love people deeply but know the difference between God’s judgement and their personal opinions, and the discernment to know which to let stick. Lets stop feeling guilty for speaking our hearts and living them out. Lets live in the moment and when the moment passes, let it go.