Change of Heart

Personal growth can bring forth amazing revelations and open doors that you didn't even realize were closed. I had one of those realizations today. I'd like to share it with the hope that it might be relateable to others.

When my daughter was a tiny baby she had her first open heart surgery.  For days after the surgery, the doctors tried to take her off the ventilator to allow her to breathe on her own. In the end, it proved not to be possible. Our little baby wasn't able to breathe properly now without the support of a breathing machine. We struggled to understand how this could be the case. For the first three months of her little life, she had been breathing on her own without the support of this machine. Why was it the case that she now could not breath properly without the support of tubes and machines? Why? We asked this question of the doctors.

Their answer was that because they had repaired her heart, it had changed the anatomy of how her body functioned overall. The heart and lungs no longer worked in concert with one another in the same way they had prior to the surgical repair of her heart.  Her heart had changed and now the rest of her body needed to also change in order to adapt. This would take time. Time. It would take time.

Photo I took of Street Tile in Pueblo Nuevo, Guatemala 

during my mission trip

I realized today that my own personal journey of transformation has been similar. While my heart has not physically been touched, my heart has been changed. It has been changed by the choices I've made and thus the experiences, people, passions, and causes I've come to know. I realized that when I question why I'm not where I want to be in certain aspects of my life, it's because the "change of heart" has created a ripple effect and the anatomy of everything else has changed now too.  I no longer see things from the same point of view, with the same "heart". Everything is different now. And just like my daughter's healing journey, "time" is required for the rest of the anatomy to catch up.

What "changes of heart" have you experienced in your life? Do you find yourself waiting and wondering when the ripple effects will be over and the anatomy of your situation will fully mend itself? Is it possible that God's timing just doesn't quite match your expectations? Can you be patient a little longer? It will be worth the wait.

Love and Prayers,

Sondra