Show My Bound Heart

As part of our bedtime routine with the kids, we sing a song. We mix it up but we skew towards older songs that they may not hear on the radio or that we may not sing as often at church. Tonight, we sang "Come, Thou Fount" (which thanks to having an AWESOME worship leader we do still sing at church).

I love this song and it almost always moves me. But tonight, as I cuddled with my precious 6-year old girl, the 3rd verse just wrecked me.

O to grace how great a debtor
daily I'm constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here's my heart, O take and seal it,
seal it for thy courts above.

My kids think I am good. I remember recently when trying to explain God's forgiveness to my daughter, she turned and looked at me and said with tears of guilt streaming down her cheeks, "But Dad, you never do anything wrong!" Now let's be clear, she knew better than that. I have had to ask for my kids forgiveness on multiple occasions. But she this is how she saw me at that moment. She saw me as "good".

Tonight, as I held her and sang the words above, I prayed that my family does not see me as good. I prayed that my friends don't see me as having it all together. I prayed that they see me bound. That they see how I struggle with wandering back to my own selfish desires and how every time My Savior's Goodness pulls me back. How daily it is grace that holds me together and to grace that I owe everything!

Prone is an appropriate word to describe the state of my heart. I am both susceptible to temptations around me and face down at the mercy of God. Praise God that His Mercy, His Goodness & His Fetter is bigger and stronger than my weaknesses. I just hope that is what the rest world sees, HIM!

UPDATE: Saw on Facebook just after writing.