Heart of Hearts

Heart of Hearts

I’ve heard the phrase used, and used it myself: heart of hearts. I supposed it meant, deep down. This is what I seriously think, or deeply love, in my heart of hearts. 

The phrase (or something quite similar) seems to have been first used by Shakespeare in Hamlet, a book, and an author I never read. We had no serious literature in my high school (which is a poor excuse), and though I read a lot of history in college, not a lot of literature. I’ve been drawn to a few significant authors since, but never Shakespeare. I think maybe I should read Hamlet.

I don’t really know the story, and I’m not sure it matters. When I think of “heart of hearts,” I tend to think a little more theologically rather than in terms of literature. Now to be sure, two people can think about something theologically and come up with very different views. But hear me out.

I am thinking about Mary, who would be the mother of Jesus, and the strange appearance of the angel who informed her of what would soon happen. She would conceive a child by way of the operation of the Holy Spirit. This was not a suggestion. It seems not to have been an invitation or a proposal. It was a statement: this is what will be.

And yet, as we read the text in Luke, Mary says the following at the end of the conversation with the angel: “Behold, the bondslave of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38). She consents to what God has ordained. And so now I ask a sticky question: did she operate according to her free will?

This is where my own definition (not Shakespeare’s) to the phrase “heart of hearts” comes in. Mary willingly assented to the plan of God that would seriously upend her life because her heart was in His hand. God had taken Mary’s heart in hand and had prepared her for a very special life of service, unbeknownst to her ahead of time, and when your heart is in God’s hand, you can’t say no. Yet she herself assented personally and freely, though she could do no other. 

Oh, I believe that there are many cases where people in fact have said “no” to God. I have to admit that I have done so myself, though I would prefer to speak of Biblical examples, like Jonah. Perhaps most of life is filled with these examples of being able to take a right turn or a left, to follow God’s will or, our own. But then there are these critical moments, in our own lives, or in Mary’s, or perhaps also Moses’ experience.

As Moses stood at the burning bush and was commissioned to represent the people of Israel before Pharaoh, the supreme leader of Egypt, and perhaps the most powerful man in the world at the time, he was dead to rights. Oh, he tried to says “No,” more than once; in fact, many times. But God would not have it. You will lead my people. Moses embraced the calling. It seems he could do no other. His life was in the hand of God, and the heart of God had mastered his own heart, even though Moses’ heart desperately sought to avoid what he knew would be a very difficult, seemingly impossible situation.

I have more thoughts about this, but the perfect picture is that of Jesus, whose heart was in the heart of the Father, and at each step, He fully agreed and fully consented to do the will of the Father, even at great cost to Himself. Jesus could have done no other. And if that is true of Jesus, why would that not be true of you?