Jane Eyre is a classic book about a poor orphan who is taken in by her aunt (Mrs. Reed). Mrs. Reed, with the help of her other children, abuses Jane in the name of discipline. She sees Jane as a rebellious, suspicious, sullen girl who needs her bad propensities shaken from her.

In one of these acts of discipline, she locks Jane in the red-room, ignoring her pleas for help. Jane later muses on that day and how it remained with her:

“No severe or prolonged bodily illness followed this incident of the red-room: it only gave my nerves a shock, of which I feel the reverberation to this day. Yes, Mrs. Reed, to you I owe some fearful pangs of mental suffering. But I ought to forgive you, for you knew not what you did: while rending my heart-strings, you thought you were only uprooting my bad propensities.”

This quote pierced me and led me to consider my own actions. Though I haven’t done anything physically that might rend a person’s heart-strings, what if I’ve spoken words that have? Do I ever give heart-string rending counsel? Do I ever deeply hurt people by my discipleship in an attempt to uproot their bad propensities?

And if so, how do I change that?

Counsel that Rends Heart-Strings

Heart-string rending counsel often begins with good intentions; there’s a sin that needs to be stoned, and so we go searching for the perfect rock to throw. We give our struggling sister or brother a list of laws to help them conquer this sin. We tell them what to put off and put on, setting up boundaries and guards to protect them from temptation. And when they come back still struggling, we pile up verses to memorize, more laws to follow, and send them digging into their hearts for the true root of the problem.

This sounds good—we want to kill sin! But there’s a reason why this kind of counsel damages believers: It ties the burden of the law on their backs and is devoid of the gospel. The Pharisees were good at this: “They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger” (Matt. 23:4). We give similar counsel when we say:

If you would just do this…If you would simply memorize this verse…If you would just use some self-control…If you prayed harder…If you looked deep inside yourself and found that sole root of your sin…Still struggling? I guess you’re doing something wrong. Or maybe you’re not saved at all.

This is the kind of heart-rending counsel we need to forsake. We need to stop telling the weak to pick themselves up by their bootstraps and do better. We need to stop teaching people to rely on their own strength and ability. The law and behavior modification can’t save us from sin. We need the gospel for true change.

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