{"id":1420,"date":"2022-02-25T08:49:40","date_gmt":"2022-02-25T13:49:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=1420"},"modified":"2022-02-25T08:49:40","modified_gmt":"2022-02-25T13:49:40","slug":"bless-your-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2022\/02\/25\/bless-your-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Bless Your Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\u201cWell, bless your heart.\u201d<\/em>
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What a wonderful thing to hear.\u00a0 Someone wants to impart a blessing upon your inmost being.\u00a0
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But before you begin to savor that inward rush of joy and gratitude, it\u2019s just possible that those words mean something else.\u00a0 \u201cBless your heart\u201d \u2013 especially if you\u2019re in the American South \u2013 can fall anywhere along a spectacular range of meaning.\u00a0 It all depends on the context.\u00a0 \u00a0
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We could be talking about endearment and affection.\u00a0 \u201cShe is the kindest person I have ever known, bless her heart.\u201d\u00a0
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Or perhaps a sincere expression of gratitude.\u00a0 \u201cBless your heart, I can\u2019t believe you went to all the trouble of finding that missing file!\u201d
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Sometimes it\u2019s a statement of sympathy.\u00a0 \u201cYou got caught in the rain without your umbrella?\u00a0 Why, bless your heart, come over here, sit by the fire and get warm.\u201d\u00a0
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Or maybe a kind way of acknowledging someone\u2019s shortcomings.\u00a0 \u201cStanley hasn\u2019t yet finished trade school, but bless his heart, he\u2019s going to go ahead and try to wire the new addition.\u201d\u00a0
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Then again, it just might be a way of saying someone is absolutely pitiful and doesn\u2019t yet know it.\u00a0 \u201cThe whole neighborhood lost power?\u00a0 Stanley must be at it again, bless his heart.\u201d
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Every human being longs to be blessed \u2013 to receive regular assurance from God and from others that all is well, and that life is worth living.\u00a0 What many of us fail to realize is that we ourselves are called to be a source of such blessings.\u00a0 We can aspire to become \u201cblessing people\u201d \u2013 those who bless others as a way of life.
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Paul says as much in Romans 12:14: \u201cBless and do not curse.\u201d\u00a0
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What does it mean to bless someone?
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Philosopher and theologian Dallas Willard writes in his book Living in Christ\u2019s Presence<\/em>, \u201cBlessing is the projection of good into the life of another.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t just words.\u00a0 It\u2019s the actual putting forth of your will for the good of another person.\u00a0 It always involves God, because when you will the good of another person, you realize that only God is capable of bringing that.\u00a0 So we naturally say, \u2018God bless you.\u2019\u201d
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Cursing someone, on the other hand, doesn\u2019t mean hurling a string of curse words in their direction, or mumbling the kind of incantation that might be featured in a horror movie.\u00a0 To curse someone is to want them to suffer \u2013 to dismiss them out of hand, to want them in your heart of hearts to feel abandoned or alone.\u00a0
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One of life\u2019s spiritual certainties is that those who curse others will find their curses crashing back upon their own heads.\u00a0 When we wish evil upon others, we ourselves become more evil.
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But those who bless others are blessed by the very act of imparting a blessing.\u00a0 That\u2019s why becoming a \u201cblessing person\u201d is one of the best things that can ever happen to us.
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Willard points out that we need to take our time when we bless someone.\u00a0 Don\u2019t be in a hurry.\u00a0 We can rattle off, \u201cGod bless you!\u201d when someone sneezes, but that\u2019s not the same as quietly and thoughtfully projecting all of God\u2019s goodness into someone else\u2019s life.
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For that matter, he adds, \u201cOne of the problems in blessing is to get the other person to hold still long enough to receive it.\u201d\u00a0
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We can be anxious, hurried, and distracted people.\u00a0 When the pastor raises his or her hand at the close of the worship service to offer a blessing, there will always be a number of folks who are thinking, \u201cIf we can just beat the traffic, we can arrive at Sunday brunch before everyone else.\u201d
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How different things might be if we believed that every time we come into God\u2019s presence, and into the presence of God\u2019s people, we have a fresh opportunity to give and receive life-sustaining blessings.
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Go ahead.\u00a0 Give it a try this weekend.
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Choose to be a channel of the matchless blessings of God\u2019s grace, peace, and comfort.\u00a0 \u00a0
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You might even hear yourself saying, \u201cBless your heart!\u201d
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And really mean it.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0\u201cWell, bless your heart.\u201d\u00a0What a wonderful thing to hear.\u00a0 Someone wants to impart a blessing upon your inmost being.\u00a0\u00a0But before you begin to savor that inward rush of joy and gratitude, it\u2019s just possible that those words mean something else.\u00a0 \u201cBless your heart\u201d \u2013 especially if you\u2019re in the American South \u2013 can fall anywhere along a spectacular range of… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1421,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[281,409],"class_list":["post-1420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-blessing","tag-curse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1420"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1420\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1422,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1420\/revisions\/1422"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}