Guest Post by Amelia Cabot: “Follow Your Heart” … or So They Say

Today I have the extreme honor of having my dear friend Amelia on for a guest post. She’s a newly-published author in the Tell Me You Love Me Anthology, and if you haven’t read that anthology yet, this is your cue to do so. Amelia’s story – as well as the others – was absolutely beautiful.

So without further ado, please welcome Amelia to the blog!

Ever realized how many times that famous industry called Disney wants to hurl that message to all of the innocent little kids watching their movies?

(Okay, granted, as a kid, I never grew up with many Disney princess movies. To this day, I still haven’t seen Aurora, or Cinderella, or most of Jasmine, or the first half of Tiana, or the portions of Mulan that weren’t fragmented, or Beauty and the Beast, or … you get the point. I was never allowed to see Ariel or Tinkerbell, for good reason, too. Disney, why you gotta let a girl comb her hair with a fork? Why? We’re crying for the fact that Ariel never got a hairbrush when she was on land, mk?

And yes, to all of you who will assume that I’m some overprotected homeschooler (and boy, am I glad for being hidden from some of the things I didn’t have to see or experience), I’ve seen some Disney princess movies. How else do you think I insulted Rapunzel once when I caught myself singing ‘I’ve Got a Dream,’ only to blurt out loud, “Nobody cares about you and your dreams, Rapunzel”?

*throws invisibility cloak over head and darts away before missing a step and tripping over a random cat that scampered into the way*)

I don’t think I have to elaborate on how often we’re encouraged to follow our hearts, as if they’re some wise sage leading us down the troubling road of life. snorts I’ve watched non-Disney movies that promote that message, thank you very much.

Yet even though we’re warned against the dangers of heart, don’t we still listen to our hearts?

Maybe you think, “But … but I don’t follow my heart! That advice is ridiculous anyway!”

You want to take a reality check for a minute?

When was the last time you complained about something when you had absolutely no need to complain because God had everything the way He wanted your life to be?

When was the last time you ever considered if the boy you like really is saved and has a heart for God instead of focusing on how he treats you well (not necessarily a bad thing though) or how good he looks?

When was the last time you turned down an opportunity to show kindness to somebody because you were too focused on self-pity for your problems and fear of what others would say or how the situation would turn out?

When was the last time you refused to do what God wanted you to do because you convinced yourself that you couldn’t do it, or that you were too scared to do it, or fill in the blank?

You don’t have to subpoena me to get me to confess that yeah, I trust my heart a lot, too.

We shouldn’t be surprised by how filthy our hearts are; Jeremiah 17:9 tells us, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Based on the four rhetorical questions I asked a few moments ago, we know that we lean towards listening to what is deceitful and desperately wicked.

Living life in this manner should send alarms screeching through our heads. We know in our heads that we shouldn’t do the exact opposite of what we should do. But our hearts? Nah. They care less. They’d rather we go frolic down the path of destruction—at least until it’s too late.

But if I left you with that last paragraph, I think I’d leave you utterly depressed.

And I’m not intending to leave you utterly depressed.

Unless I wrote something that happened to be dark for the sake of a story plot and you read it and then became utterly depressed.

In that case, proceed so that I can know how to afflict you as my reader even further.

The questionable writer within me aside …

Don’t you just love how God’s going to give us strength to not act as if we’ve got one brain cell bouncing erratically around in our heads? In II Corinthians 12:9, Paul talked about what God told him when he had a thorn in the flesh: “And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

I’m going to forsake my nit-picky grammar self for a second and say that if God’s ability to give perfecting strength ain’t awesome, then your version of awesome is clearly different from mine.

Yes, there is hope for us to not act impulsively with our heart! All we have to do is ask God for strength to stay the course. And if we mess up, He’s still willing to forgive us based on I John 1:9, which promises that “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Absolute beauty right there. (Why can’t I think of a better word than beauty? Sigh. You should know what I mean though. It’s starting to get me excited to know that God’s with us and will help us do what’s right.)

Can’t we keep loving how Jesus Christ’s blood that was shed when He died on the cross already covers how many times you’ll run to the flesh’s impulses instead of the Holy Spirit’s guidance? And the fact that He didn’t stay dead but that He rose again three days later is still even more awesome!!

And the fact that’s greater and more awesome is that His gift of salvation is free! All we have to do is repent and believe on His finished work, and He’ll never leave us nor forsake us.

So reader, know that you don’t have to stay stumped on how much you rely on your heart. As a Christian, regardless of how long you’ve been saved, you will still struggle with doing wrong and listening to the wrong voices.

Yet we have an Almighty Heavenly Father Who forgives and loves and gives strength way more than we deserve to be given any of those gifts.

And what better option than this could exist?

About the Author

Amelia Cabot is a sinner saved by grace through faith in Christ Jesus, homeschooler, and Christian fiction/poetry writer who has embraced the world of writing since she was six. She can typically be found in the corner of the living room at her desk, mostly due to the fact that she lives in an apartment and doesn’t use her room half of the time. Although she hasn’t published her own novels, she has dabbled in writing contests, with the Tell Me You Love Me anthology as the first official work she has been published in. When she’s not writing, she’s mentally correcting improper grammar (and punctuation, and capitalization, and spelling), uncovering the enigmas of the piano and violin, singing, comprehending Spanish, or daydreaming about her characters and their never-ending predicaments.