"Let them see your heart!" admonishes my pastor for the umpteenth time this month. As we sit in the office after another long day of meetings and notes and decisions and ideas, discussing the pros and cons of ministry in the uttermost parts of the earth, um, I mean St. George.

As I turn this reminder over and over in my mind, I find myself empty. What is my heart?

Some say look to what mattered to you as a child to find what lies deepest within. I'm not sure that too much mattered to me then except decorating the forts I would build in the woods and practicing my piano. As a teenager I was passionate about hurting children. I wanted to save them all and become a social worker or a teacher. I would cry over the abused and abandoned in movies books. As a college student I was passionate about learning, asking questions, baiting my professors, and getting the most out of the student loans I was accumulating. As a newly married woman I was passionate about mentoring young girls and discipling them through the teenage years I had just completed. Then for six years I threw myself into managing the Manna House and became passionate about equipping local churches, creating relational bridges in the community, and building the business.

Now, just a year after selling the store, I find myself too busy to ponder the motivation the drives me. Wouldn't a good Christian say that the thought of serving Jesus for another day gets them out of bed in the morning? The truth is, the thought of marking a nice chunk off my to do list gets me out of bed in the morning.

Wow - that's revealing.

The heart of the matter is the heart. We all have high times when we feel deeply about what we do. And there are other times when we don't feel anything. We just do. But when we serve in faithfulness no matter the feelings, there is joy on the other side. This passage is such an encouragement to me regarding hard times and how they grow us:

And now, isn't it wonderful all the ways in which this distress has goaded you closer to God? You're more alive, more concerned, more sensitive, more reverent, more human, more passionate, more responsible. Looked at from any angle, you've come out of this with purity of heart. And that is what I was hoping for in the first place when I wrote the letter. My primary concern was not for the one who did the wrong or even the one wronged, but for you—that you would realize and act upon the deep, deep ties between us before God. That's what happened—and we felt just great.

Here is what it boils down to. It doesn't matter what drove you as a child, adult, or anything in between. What matters is where God has you right here, right now. Where He calls you, He equips, empassions, and empowers. I see myself walking in that truth every day. In the moments when I find myself so inadequate. So overwhelmed. So busy. Tears may remain for a night but rejoicing comes in the morning - it's a promise!

So what is my heart? Who flippin knows? But geez, I hope they see it!