HEART DIAGNOSIS

Nobody's going to tell you this. You sinned. You feel terrible. On your knees. "God, how could I do that? What is WRONG with me?" How could I. What's wrong with me. I'm such a failure. Every sentence starts with "I." Not one word about God. Not one word about who you sinned AGAINST. When David sinned he said "Against thee, thee only have I sinned." THEE. THEE. THEE. His grief pointed upward. Yours points inward. One leads to change. The other just leads to a better self-image. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. You did something generous. A week later, they let you down. And from nowhere: "After everything I did for you." You never told them you were keeping count. But you were. Every favor. Every sacrifice. Filed. You weren't giving. You were lending at interest. And the interest was their loyalty. It was a transaction disguised as love. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. You pray differently when someone can hear you. The vocabulary changes. The cadence changes. Theology shows up that never shows up alone. But alone — five minutes. Distracted. Can barely finish a thought. The audience changed. And the prayer changed with it. So who were you talking to? You weren't praying to God in front of them. You were performing for them in front of God. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "I'm just being honest." That's what you say right before you open someone up. But watch what happens in your chest after. There's a flush. Not the grief of hurting someone. The satisfaction of standing over them with something they can't argue with. Your honesty wasn't for them. It was a weapon. And "I'm just being honest" was the permission slip. Truth in the wrong hands is the most sophisticated form of deception. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. What's the FIRST thing you do when you learn something? You tell someone. "I was actually reading about this the other day..." You're not sharing knowledge. You're displaying it. That's why you're more excited to DISCUSS what you read than to OBEY it. Paul didn't say knowledge destroys. He said it INFLATES. And inflated things are hollow. Your bookshelf is not your sanctification. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. Prayer answered. Crisis resolved. Your heart swelled with love for God. But did the love come before the blessing — or after? Because if it came after, you didn't fall in love with God. You fell in love with the relief. Satan understood this before any theologian did. "Does Job serve God for nothing?" Even the devil knew that subsidized love is worthless. Would you worship the God who didn't answer? If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. Someone praises you. You deflect. "All glory to God." And you walk away feeling humble. But pride doesn't just hide behind your sins. It hides behind your GRACES. Your patience. Your gentleness. Your humility. Especially your humility. Because that's the last place anyone would look. Pride in a sin is clumsy. Pride wearing humility — that's a masterpiece. It's the one disguise that gets applauded. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. Someone you love is suffering. You feel it. You post about it. You tell people how broken you are. But broken for THEM — or for what their pain does to YOUR world? La Rochefoucauld: "We all have strength enough to bear the misfortunes of others." And some grief is even simpler. You grieve because NOT grieving would make you look cold. The tears aren't for them. They're for your image. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. You see someone struggling. Your heart goes out. You want to help. And it feels selfless. But why does helping feel so GOOD? Because compassion only flows downward. The helper is above. The helped is below. And your ego knows exactly which position it prefers. You're not being selfless. You're enjoying a view that only exists because someone else is lower than you. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. You learned you're elect. Chosen before the foundation of the world. And something shifted. Not just peace — a sense of being SPECIAL. Set apart. Not like them. Edwards: "Their very lusts will make Christ seem lovely. Pride itself will prejudice them in favor of that which they call Christ." Your PRIDE can manufacture love for Jesus. Not the real Jesus — a Jesus shaped by your self-love. One who confirms how special you are. Same doctrine. Same Bible. Completely different hearts. And the feelings are identical. That's what makes it terrifying. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. Someone compliments you. You wave it off. "No no — it was nothing." So they push harder. "No seriously, that was incredible." Now you've been praised twice. Here's the test. If they had just said "okay" and moved on — would you feel relieved? Or bothered? La Rochefoucauld: "Refusing praise reveals a desire to be praised twice." 1665. The game hasn't changed. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. You sinned again. The same sin. And something strange happened — you didn't just feel guilty. You felt a dark kind of comfort. "This is who I am. This is what I do." That resignation felt better than fighting. Because fighting means hoping. And hoping means you might fail again. So you stopped hoping. Dostoevsky: "I found pleasure in the very feeling of my own degradation." Not because he enjoyed suffering. But because suffering asked NOTHING of him. The guilt isn't repentance. It's a sedative. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. Your prayers used to be raw. Desperate. You'd pour yourself out like water. What happened? You grew in knowledge. And without noticing, the prayers got shorter. More polished. Less desperate. You started praying like someone who understands grace instead of someone who needs it. That's why new believers pray like they're drowning and mature believers pray like they're filing paperwork. "I remember the devotion of your youth, your love as a bride." He misses the version of you that couldn't survive without Him. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. You realize you've been a hypocrite. Something clicks. "I've been fake. I see it now." And that feels GOOD. Because you just leveled up. You're no longer a hypocrite — you're the rare person who's HONEST about their hypocrisy. And that honesty just became your new performance. Dostoevsky: "I was lying. And the confession was also a lie." Jeremiah said the heart is deceitful above ALL things. Not some things. ALL. There is no floor. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "I'll deal with it tomorrow." You've said that about the same sin for months. And it feels responsible. You're not ignoring it — you're scheduling it. But tomorrow lets you keep the sin today in exchange for a promise you never intend to keep. Sin doesn't need your yes. It just needs your not yet. Felix said it to Paul's face — "When I find a convenient time, I will call for you." He never called. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. It didn't start with the thing you're ashamed of. It started with something small. A glance. A thought you let sit three seconds too long. "It's nothing." But sin never asks for the whole thing at once. It asks for an inch. Just consider it. Just look. Just this once. Sin gains more ground by inches than by assault — because an assault you'd fight. A slow drift feels like standing still. The last step feels exactly like the first. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. You had a genuine moment with someone. Real vulnerability. And then you ruined it. Made a joke. Pulled back. Maybe picked a fight. Because the genuine moment made you feel exposed. You showed something real and you can't control what they do with it. So you killed it. Rewrote it as something smaller. "It wasn't that deep." It was that deep. You know it was. That's why you had to destroy it. The real thing was the only thing worth having. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. You're quick to admit your small faults. "I struggle with patience." "I should pray more." La Rochefoucauld: "We confess to small faults only to persuade others that we have no great ones." Your transparency is a strategy. By admitting the small stuff, you build a reputation for honesty that makes people assume there's nothing bigger underneath. They weren't hiding their sins by denying them. They were hiding their sins by confessing different ones. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. You started performing years ago. The Christian smile. The right answers. And at first you knew it was a performance. You felt the gap. But the gap closed. Not because you became real — because the mask fused to your face. "We become so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that at last we are disguised to ourselves." You can't remove a mask you can no longer feel. You can't repent of a performance you've forgotten you're giving. You might be the last person to know who you really are. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. You're loyal. Dependable. The friend who shows up. And that's become central to who you are. "The fidelity of most men is merely an invention of self-love to win confidence — a method to place us above others." Every time you show up and someone else doesn't, you win a quiet comparison. You're not loyal to them. You're loyal to the version of yourself that loyalty produces. "You have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead." If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "Money doesn't matter." "I'm content with little." "God is enough." But are those words coming from peace — or are you baptizing your limitation and calling it a conviction? "The contempt of riches was only a hidden desire to avenge their merit upon the injustice of fortune." You couldn't get it. So you made not wanting it a virtue. And now you look DOWN on people who have it. Paul had both abundance and need. His contentment wasn't poverty-only. Can you say the same? If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. "Our virtues are most frequently but vices disguised." Your patience — might be cowardice avoiding conflict. Your generosity — might be pride buying loyalty. Your gentleness — might be fear dressed in a Sunday suit. Isaiah didn't say our sins are filthy rags. He said our RIGHTEOUSNESSES are filthy rags. The good stuff. The stuff you're proud of. You'll never produce a virtue clean enough to trust. And the moment you think you have — that confidence is the vice wearing its finest disguise. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. You think your beliefs shape your desires. That learning the right doctrine will fix the wrong impulse. "The head is ever the dupe of the heart." Your theology doesn't control your desires. Your desires choose your theology. You landed on the doctrine that made you feel the way you wanted to feel. That's why two people read the same Bible and arrive at opposite convictions. The text didn't change. The hearts were different. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

"Our repentance is not so much sorrow for what we've done — as fear of what might happen to us." Three hundred years ago. Nothing's changed. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

"Self-love is more cunning than the most cunning man in the world." You will never outsmart your own heart. That's why you need something outside yourself to search it. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

"If we had no faults, we should not take so much pleasure in noting those of others." You see their sin so clearly because yours needs the distraction. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

"The gratitude of most men is but a secret desire of receiving greater benefits." You're not grateful. You're investing. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody counterfeits copper. The more excellent a thing is, the more counterfeits it produces. More fake diamonds than fake rocks. And there are more counterfeits of love and humility than any other grace — because those are the ones worth faking. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. "We try to make a virtue of vices we are loth to correct." You couldn't stop being controlling, so you called it leadership. You couldn't stop being passive, so you called it patience. You couldn't stop being harsh, so you called it discernment. You didn't change the sin. You changed the label. And now you defend it like a doctrine. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "Our pride is often increased by what we retrench from our other faults." Every sin you cut became a line on your résumé. You stopped drinking — pride got promoted. You stopped lusting — pride got a corner office. You cleaned up your tongue — pride started writing your sermons. You didn't weaken pride by killing its soldiers. You gave it a bigger army. Isaiah 64:6. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. "Our enemies come nearer the truth in the opinions they form of us than we do in our opinion of ourselves." The person who can't stand you? They see you clearly. The critic you dismiss? They're looking at what you spend all day hiding from. Self-love blinds you to yourself — but it doesn't blind anyone else. Everyone in the room knows. You're the only one who doesn't. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "There is often more pride than goodness in our grief for our enemies' miseries. It is to show how superior we are to them that we bestow on them the sign of our compassion." You prayed for the person who wronged you. And it felt good. Not because you loved them — because it proved you were better than them. Your forgiveness was a throne. Your compassion was a crown. And God saw the whole performance. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. "Many wish to be devout; but no one wishes to be humble." You want the reputation of a prayer life. You want the knowledge of a theologian. You want the discipline of a monk. But you don't want the one thing every one of those requires: to be nothing. And here's the test. La Rochefoucauld: "True penitential sorrows are those which are not known. Vanity renders the others easy enough." The repentance no one sees — that's the real one. Everything else is a show you're charging admission for. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. "We trouble ourselves less to become happy than to make others believe we are so." You spend more energy curating the appearance of a good life than building one. The Instagram post took longer than the moment it captured. The testimony was more polished than the transformation. And the terrifying part: it's working. Everyone believes you. Which means no one actually knows you. Which means you are completely alone. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. La Rochefoucauld wrote an essay so devastating he suppressed it from later editions. In it he says: self-love conspires for its own loss and works towards its own ruin — caring only to exist. When it fancies it abandons its pleasure, it merely changes or suspends its enjoyment. And when even conquered in full flight — we find that it triumphs in its own defeat. Let that sink in. Self-love WINS by losing. The moment you feel proud of killing your pride, it resurrected in the same breath. It doesn't need to survive. It just needs to exist — in any form, under any name, wearing any mask. Isaiah 64:6. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

Nobody's going to tell you this. "Men increase the number of their faults by certain qualities they affect to assume, which they cultivate with such assiduity that at length they become natural faults which they can no longer correct." You practiced your cynicism until it felt like wisdom. You rehearsed your detachment until it felt like strength. You performed your edge until it felt like personality. And now you can't tell the difference between the mask and the face. Neither can anyone else. The role became the man. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

You already know this, you're just hoping I won't say it. "The same self-love that usually blinds us enlightens us, and gives us such true views as to make us suppress or disguise the smallest thing that might be censured." You're not blind. You see your faults perfectly. Self-love gave you 20/20 vision — not to fix them, but to HIDE them. You know exactly which faults to confess and which to bury. You know the precise angle that makes you look honest without costing you anything. Your self-awareness is not humility. It's surveillance. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.

I hate to be the one to tell you this. "The desire to be pitied or to be admired often forms the greater part of our confidence." When you opened up about your struggle, you weren't seeking help. You were seeking a specific REACTION. You wanted the head tilt. The soft voice. The 'I'm so proud of you for sharing that.' Owen calls it readiness to accept excuses — when the soul is willing to be courted by sin, to hearken to its dalliances. You dressed your weakness in vulnerability and waited for applause. If you want conviction in the age of compromise, you know where to find me.