Swollen Hearts

Three nights ago I saw a dark valley filled with beating hearts. They all were beating at different paces. I noticed that they were enlarged. They didn't look normal. Then I heard, "swollen hearts." I asked myself, "Is it possible to have a heart that's big because it's filled with so much pain?" Could it be that some of the most beautiful, sweetest, and most loving people you will ever meet are the ones walking around with swollen hearts? Hearts filled with raw love but held captive by hurt, betrayal, and disappointment?

 I can tell someone has a swollen heart when I listen to how he or she talks and how he or she moves and how they interact with others. 

People with swollen hearts are notorious commitment phobes. They are committed to being uncommitted. Why? Because at some point in their lives they created the committee. They were the epitome of die-hard commitment, poster children at best, but something or somebody broke them. 

Imagine someone snatching a vinyl record from off a turntable and smashing it over their knee. 

They were broken. And sometimes broken things swell. 

For them it hurts to hold in their love because their love isn't meant to be kept on them too long. Yet, they won't let it go because the fear is so strong. The fear of being enslaved again by the selfishness and evilness of men and women. The fear of being contaminated or negatively affected by other people's issues and deficiencies.

Psalm 69:20
Reproach has broken my heart and I am so sick And I looked for sympathy, but there was none, And for comforters, but I found none.

Considering tomorrow marks the first day of the month of "Love," I'm sensing these swollen hearts will begin to bleed and cry out, not for worldly affections though, but for the emancipation of their love. Crying out for their hearts to be restored back to its factory settings. Bleeding for that place where their hearts were, way before they were ever broken. 

#TransparentMoment

I myself have experienced various types of heartbreaks, and they chipped away at me and motivated the decisions I would make over the course of my life. My first blog post of this year, I shared how a heartbreak caused a wedge between me and God for almost 15 years. I experienced my first real romantic heartbreak at the age of 20 by the one I'd given my virginity to a year prior. That heartbreak severely tarnished my self-esteem, my confidence, my self-worth, and my view of love period. I no longer felt pure. I no longer felt like I deserved love. As a result, I would just give myself away to men and their perversions, with a little bit of hope that maybe I would luck up and receive the love I was so desperately seeking. To no avail. I only kept running into heartbreak after heartbreak. A few times these heartbreaks would have me contemplating suicide including the ones from three years ago. I called these the SUPER HEARTBREAK, because they would occur right around the same time by people I loved with my entire life. My spiritual mother and my pastor at the time would be the ones I willfully revealed my naked vulnerable true self to and they would be the ones who at every turn did everything in their power to break me all the way down to an ashy heap of shame, embarrassment, and agonizing emotional pain. I'm often haunted by their cruel methods and harsh practices all in the name of "love". 

Three nights ago I saw a dark valley filled with beating hearts.

One of those hearts were mine.

Isaiah 61:1

The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, Because the LORD has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives And freedom to prisoners;

The revelation that my heart was also in that valley, shocked me. I thought my heart was fine. But God said not so. Though I have recently been properly guarding my heart from allowing any new toxins from seeping in, God revealed to me that there are old toxins that has yet to be purged out. He also let me know that in order for these toxins to be flushed out, I would have to be open and willing to release my fierce grip so that I may love without reservations and time limits. 

God was loving enough to ask, "Tanzy, how do you feel about this." I was honest. I begin to rattle off reasons why this could not work and reasons why I would prefer to reject this. I pretty much adamantly told Him "No." 

Then He showed me how no matter how much I achieved in life there would be some amazing beautiful gardens in the kingdom I would not have access to, as long as I refuse to be open to love and be loved freely. 

You see, relationships are one of God's ways of blessing us and even bestowing to us the desires of our hearts. A lot of what we're asking Him for is not going to come falling out of the sky! One of my all time favorite scriptures, Hebrews 13:2, mentions how we should show hospitality to strangers because some who have done so have entertained angels. Isn't that something? What if I told you that the keys to your next FEW breakthroughs this year, will be found in the hearts of other people. What if I told you, that there are people God has set aside to love you in ways unimaginable but He can't give them the green light to love on you until your heart is no longer swollen. God wants to show you another side of Him, through someone else who was created in His image. But you block Him with your futile and feverish attempts to remain in control of something you never really had control of in the first place. I see you. You give God your heart. Then you take it back when you're afraid. Perfect love casts out fear, beloved. Your super heartbreak might not look like mine. Doesn't matter, your heart is swollen. Let God flush your heart so that it can beat without the pain. You are so deserving of the love that you desire. Open up and let Him in. 

Are you in the mood? 

G.I.N.O 

God Is Number One