The Fate of a Rotting Heart

By Amy Kochek

In a society where physical appearance is of utmost importance, we spend a great deal of time and effort to successfully dress up our public world. At face value, we look good, smell good, and sound good. But what would happen if someone saw your private world? Just like a tree, you can look healthy on the outside, but inside you can be slowly rotting and dying all while presenting a healthy exterior. If not tended to, your fate will be a silent, slow death that can impact your life and the lives of those you touch. This book will take you on a journey into your secret sins, wounds, and behaviors that are slowly eroding your integrity. As you find freedom through exposure, you will discover the hope that occurs when you go from rotting to thriving.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781502324948

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Chapter 1

Truth Revealed in the Silence

The resounding voice booms over the loud speakers as the camera spans the auditorium, which is filled to capacity. Hands lift and voices rise as the preacher admonishes the audience with the life-changing message of the Gospel. His voice emboldens with conviction as he preaches on the evils of sin and the necessity of repentance. He paces back and forth on the expansive stage that is ornamented with a large oak podium. The preacher wipes his brow with his silk embroidered sweat cloth as the panting of his voice times perfectly with the accompaniment of the organ. As he journeys into the crowd, the atmosphere appears to be what one would imagine during the days of Jesus - throngs of people trying to get near this man of God. Attempts to touch and grip at his clothes are thwarted by his security officers. The preacher’s eyes scan the audience until he makes contact with one weary saint. He places his hand on her head and he begins to speak prophetic words over her life, and the weary woman weeps uncontrollably as her body weakens and limply plummets into the arms of an appointed altar worker. The preacher backs away and walks toward the stage to signify the completion of his assigned task. As the cries and groans of the audience continue to increase, the preacher concludes his message with a plea for repentance and salvation. The altars fill as the preacher conducts his last round of prayer; the crowd ferociously presses their way towards the front, eager to have his anointed hands placed on their forehead. When the evening ends, a record amount of healings and deliverances take place, and the preacher smiles and greets his guests and members on the way up to his office. Shutting the door behind him, the preacher sits in his expansive chair, leans forward, puts his head in his hands and begins to bitterly sob. A handkerchief is used in an attempt to muffle the noise, but the raw emotion feels like an untamed dam that is moments from a catastrophic burst. Head throbbing! Pulse quickening! Thoughts and images flashing in dizzying panorama! His body weary from all the internal fighting that has been waging for the past two years. Exhausted from the selfish pretense, one understands the need for a moment of solitude to reflect. No one would ever know. For the past two years, he made sure that his wife remained satisfied. He was meticulous with his schedule and ensured that she never felt neglected. Showering her with gifts and maintaining a peaceful home created a picture that to the outsider, appeared successful. His ministry was global with a congregation that was larger than it had ever been, with loyal parishioners, ample money in the bank, and messages that were some of the most profound and revelatory sermons ever preached. He was well-known and respected amongst the community and peers, yet after the final light switch flipped, the church sign dimmed, and the front doors were secured, life presented a different side. His cell phone was safely guarded, missed call logs consistently cleared, and specific messages expeditiously deleted. He hated himself, hated every secret rendezvous, hated this unquenchable desire that had recently risen inside of him. Each time he lied, This would be the last time! but he knew that it wasn’t that simple. He was in too deep. The preacher’s separate computer with protected files was the perfect way of escape. With every click, the erotic images called like a drug helping the man escape from every situation. Rubbing his face one last time, while taking a deep breath causes the sensation of suffocation that always ensued in these moments of quiet. He feels unction to pray but the exhaustion becomes an excuse for silence. His prayers were shorter and strained as of late. He couldn’t seem to get God’s attention, and he couldn’t seem to shake these desires. He grips his Bible with conviction and before he could crack the binding, he begins to pick up the phone and dial her number once again.

She exits her car on a brisk fall day with her Bible and notebook tucked tightly under her left arm. Heels clicking in almost perfect harmony with the swaying of a crisply ironed skirt accompany her quick shuffle past the greeters in the lobby in order to rush to her Sunday school classroom. She is running late and her lesson was not quite complete, but the students are already in place and greet her with great excitement, which means that pushing through her own exhaustion and apathy in order to teach with the correct passion that her students need is her only option. Based on their inquisitive responses and reflective discussion, the desired success is achieved. Immediately following Sunday school, she races down to the storage room to retrieve a choir robe since praise and worship is moments from commencing. Fighting every thought that comes as a reminder of her wishes to just sit on the back row and be invisible, she barely has time to whisper a prayer before going up on the platform. She sings, lifts her hands, and speaks the words of praise that are appropriate for that moment when tears begin to fall from her face and soak the collar of the uncomfortable choir robe in a moment that feels like a sweet release. During the sermon, she follows the normal Sunday routine that involves voracious note taking, emphatic nods and decisive responses such as, Amen and That’s Right! The Word prompts another steady stream of tears motivating her to join the others at the altar where she spends a few moments shedding more tears and then immediately begins to pray with others. She whispers words of encouragement, joins hands of agreement with a few seekers, and lays hands on women as they weep. The music dies down and the bodies lain on the altar begin to dwindle. Intercepting the return to her seat, another young woman approaches her and asks for counsel. The young lady gives sound, biblical advice and prays with the other woman. They exchange their goodbyes and while gathering her things, a long deep breath gives the strength needed to shuffle back to her car. She closes the car door, grips the steering wheel, and stares ahead at no particular target as the intensity of her breathing increases. It was quiet in her car, too quiet and this silence invites a painful truth that has brought overwhelming pain for the past three years. She is alone. Actually, it was more than that. She was lonely. She attended every purity seminar, every singles conference, read countless books, and had two purity rings and a bookmark with a catchy poem entitled, I’ll Wait for You. Well, no one said the waiting would be a literal eternity. It was in the waiting that the true desires of her heart were revealed. She was tired, exhausted actually. There had to be more than this. At church, tears came easily, promises flowed freely, and confidence was quickly renewed. But the reality of her life struck immediately in the silence.

At face value, the above stories create an unlikely paradox. Individuals, who seemingly dedicated their lives to the ministry and to God, yet find themselves in a place of extreme struggle and confusion. These are people who possess great gifts and talents and wield a inordinate amount of influence within every arena they inhabit. They are intelligent and possess a great deal of wisdom. They appear to have great success in both their personal and professional lives. Those around them may testify to the impact that their lives have on others. They may even be convinced of their own soundness of character. If they were to be assessed by what they present on the outside, then all of the above statements would indeed be true. They would be great leaders whose lives are submitted to the work and ministry of Christ. However, the truth does not lie in the noise of their outward performance, but in the silence of their inward sins; their secret sins.

It is in this silence and hidden area that this book is meant to address. This is not a book that will show you how to put habits and patterns into your life to make you a better Christian. This is not a book that is meant to equip you with more affirmation statements and studying techniques. This is a book that challenges your true self. The person no one else sees. You know the person well, but have done all you can to shield this person from others. You allow others to see only what you will show them while on the inside you frantically struggle to keep your secrets. Even though some of you may not be able to identify specifically with the scenarios above, all of us can identify with secrets. All of us can identify with pretense. This is especially true for those of us who attend church. It is as if pretense has become a prerequisite for church attendance. We all come to church, admire our outward appearance, and relish our outward show of servitude, while the inside remains neglected and decayed. This book seeks to penetrate your INTEGRITY or lack thereof. This book is meant to challenge you to be the person you are in public and when no one is watching. And don’t you think you have to be committing some gross, heinous sin to lack integrity. Integrity is a heart issue and it remains hidden until it begins to manifest itself within the issues of your life. As you embark on the journey through this book, I pray that you would ask God to search your heart. The truths presented in this book are sobering and will ask for extreme honesty, but know that your freedom is contingent upon your willingness to confront your true self with the Word of God and remain willing to make the necessary changes to become a true man or woman of INTEGRITY.

The stories I share from my own life are raw and at the time, were some of my best-kept secrets. There was a time when I felt so lost between the pretense and secrets; I didn’t know what was real or what was fantasy. I was drowning and hopeless. But here is the beauty of my God. Here is the good news: In the midst of my pain and in the midst of my darkest hour emerged the Love of God. And from my pain came my testimony because He did not leave me there to die. Out of those experiences birthed the essence of this book.

I am not seeking to gloat or to receive some badge of suffering. Conversely, I expose myself to create, within this book, a place of refuge where you feel safe to start peeling away your own layers. Whether we openly admit it or not, each of us is wrapped in multifaceted layers. For some, those layers may be innumerable, for others they may seem less mountainous. Either way, this is the word from the Lord: if you will but expose yourself to the cross, you will find healing and restoration like you have never known. As we continue through this journey, your integrity will be challenged and tested, but it is in those moments that true healing will occur, but you must be willing to travel this journey naked. You cannot have any baggage or garments protecting you. You must allow God’s word to unravel you and begin to cleanse your inner man; otherwise this will be a fruitless journey. This will wind up being yet another book on your shelf that makes you look like an accomplished Christian scholar. I trust and believe that this won’t be the case with you though. I trust and believe that you are weary and tired of pretense. You are tired of faking it. You don’t like who you are and you are tired of resenting and despising yourself. It is in this state that I ask you to take this journey with me into the depths of the truth, the importance, and the necessity of integrity. I’m praying for you through each chapter of this book that you wouldn’t just grasp it intellectually, but that your heart and soul would make a supernatural connection to the truths found within and that you receive the healing and restoration that God has already designed for your life. There are short prayers at the beginning of each chapter. I encourage you to pray each prayer aloud before beginning the chapter and take heart in my testimony. Know that if He can love and extend grace, mercy, and forgiveness to a wretched sinner like me, then he can do the same for you. Let’s