"Would you quiet your whimpering?!? I'm trying to think," Mind growled with an intellectual indifference.
"I can't help it. This is just so moving!" His companion, Heart, emotionally retorted, wiping away tears.
I promise you, my head and heart do not have audible conversations within my soul; however, I’ve learned there must be peaceful balance between them. As a follower of Christ, I’m called to think and feel as the Lord Jesus does.
The first week of this semester, I learned more about the balance between head and heart. In music class, my professor taught that the arts diverge into two braches: classic, which is orderly and logical, and romantic, which is free and more emotional. Head and heart have arm-wrestled throughout music history.
In preaching class, my professor taught that ministering the Word is both a science, involving mental discipline, and an art, requiring the Holy Spirit’s influence on the preacher’s heart. Head and heart must cooperate under the unction of the Holy Spirit to deliver an effective message.
John 1:12 speaks of both receiving Jesus and believing in His Name. The LORD, through John, explains there’s an experiential and an intellectual component to becoming born again as a child of God through Jesus Christ (Jn. 3). We believe the truth of the Gospel and turn from lawbreaking to follow Christ.
I was baptized as an infant and grew up in a church where I learned about the Bible. My head was full of knowledge, but I hadn’t encountered the Risen Christ. He hadn’t yet pricked my heart with a godly sorrow that brings repentance (2 Cor. 7:10). When I heard the Gospel call to repent and be saved, the Holy Spirit brought conviction of sin and my need for Jesus. I received and believed.
I heard Apologist Josh McDowell explain on the radio that it was not just intellectual doubt that kept him from faith. Deep emotional wounds from his earthly father hindered his heart from believing in the Heavenly Father. He was convinced an Almighty Father would only cause him more pain. The Holy Spirit used both the love and the intellectual evidence of those who witnessed to McDowell to draw him to Jesus.
Everything done well in this life must involve a redeemed head and heart. When we act only from the head, we cause pain. When we’re simply moved by the heart, we cause trouble. The unregenerate “heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked” and the mind must be renewed (Jer. 17:9; Rom. 12:2).
Neither emotion nor reason is inherently evil. They are gifts of God, evidence that people are handcrafted in His Image. There’s an element of reason and emotion required for every wise decision, drawing from learned Scriptural principles and listening for the Holy Spirit's still, small voice.
This balance between head and heart is not something I dwell on or am introspective about. I listen to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to convict me. When I act unwisely or uncaringly, He convicts. When He puts His finger on a specific sin, I turn from the sin to Jesus and move forward.
Will head and heart ever get along? Through the cleansing Blood of Jesus, they sure can. We must eagerly desire both Christ-like thinking and feeling. The head and the heart are, after all, soulmates.
