“Jesus Loves Me This I Know” — Seeking God With Our Heads AND Our Hearts

I confess I am a nerd, and not just any nerd, a Christian one. 

It all started in tenth grade. After attending classes at my science high school, I would take a jeepney to the nearby university to attend a weekly Christian apologetics meeting. There, a patient campus minister addressed the curious questions of high school and college students — from politics to Creationism, from original sin to predestination, from free will to the existence of evil in the world. 

I learned about how the manuscripts of the Bible were passed down from one generation to another, the difference between Calvinism and Arminianism, and how many centuries of prophecy pointed to Jesus. Even though I was raised in a Christian home, I felt like I met Jesus again with my mind. And as a nerd — a Christian nerd — I loved it. 

Before all that, I grew up in a Pentecostal church where aunts spoke in tongues and elders prophesied. Our congregation called these manifestations of the Holy Spirit. Although the intellectual pursuit of faith was not discouraged, it was also not encouraged. 

Finding Christian apologetics felt like a paradigm shift. 

Learning that my faith had a rich intellectual tradition that could bear the weight of my questions was comforting. I hadn’t realized that my faith had teeth. It had a rich historic tradition and contributions to society. I didn’t realize before that there was a reason for my hope that went beyond emotions. 

As a good student, the academic rigor was exhilarating. And yet, it wore out over time, and eventually wasn’t enough to keep my faith. I couldn’t intellectualize my way around the reality of suffering and evil in the world. I felt detached from God because my emotions and my mind weren’t aligned with each other. 

Aligning the Head and Heart 

In following Jesus, it can be easy to make demarcations between what the heart feels and what the mind thinks. The foundations of Western philosophy are structured this way, with influential thinkers like Aristotle and Descartes introducing us to mind-body dualism, “I think, therefore I am.” Although some of this is true, it is not the whole truth. We can easily fall into the trap of intellectualizing our way into the right theology, but Christ asks for more than just that. 

When our Christian experience can draw from the intellectual and emotional wells of understanding, we can become more equipped to see God holistically. We won’t make idols out of our knowledge or our emotions. Instead, we can entrust both to the God who can search and test both. Do you find yourself leaning more toward your head or your heart in your pursuit of Jesus? 

What Scripture Says 

Throughout Scripture, we see that the heart has thoughts. In Matthew 9:4, Jesus confronts the Pharisees and says, “Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your hearts?” Then later, in Matthew 15:19, he says, “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander.” The heart is the place where our ruminations and revelations well up. This is where God meets us, and it does not exist separately from the brain.  

“Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts,” says David in Psalm 139:23. This act of asking God to search us invites the Spirit to show the possible imbalances in our thinking. So we echo the psalmist’s prayer in balancing our head and heart in our spiritual walk — we ask God to search us and test us, understanding that he is a gracious God who knows both our heart and our thoughts. As Christians, let us follow Christ with both. 

Next Steps 

If you find yourself leaning more toward your head, I invite you to incorporate the Examen prayer into your routine. This reflection will help you to examine your emotions, and reflect on where you’ve felt God’s consolation and desolation in your daily life. He may speak to you in the way you experience your emotions, and comfort you through the difficulty of complicated feelings without judgment. 

 If you find yourself leaning more toward your heart, I invite you to incorporate in-depth Scripture study or read a book on Christian apologetics. Being in the posture of a student also harnesses the humility with which we take up our faith. Lastly, this can help you witness to friends who are curious about why you believe and gives you the tools to engage in spiritual conversations with them. You can also care for them better by addressing their questions about faith. 

If you find yourself in a balanced state, I invite you to keep going. It can be tedious and tiring to have to constantly examine ourselves but this is the journey of the Christian who is made to experience God, people, and the world with both a head and heart. 

In my faith walk, I had to learn not to despise one or the other. After all, the God of wisdom requires that I love him with my whole head, whole soul, whole heart, and whole strength (Mark 12:30). May we continue to yield to him with the entirety of our beings and align every aspect of our self to his gracious leading.