| Written By Administrator Friday, 17 July 2009 |
The heart of man, in Scripture, refers to a person’s inner life or inner
man.
The quality of a person’s life depends on the condition of his heart. “To
change our life, we must change our heart!” The following verses confirm
this truth:
Proverbs 4:23- The heart is the wellspring of life.
Matthew 12:35- The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in
him and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.
Mark 7:20 to 23- What comes out of a man is what makes him unclean. For
from within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality,
theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit………….All these evils come from
inside and make a man unclean!
The Condition of the Human Heart
Ezekiel 11:19,20 and 36:26,27
The natural heart of man is made of stone and is hardened. But God, under
the New Covenant, gives the repentant believer a new heart which is a
fleshy, sensitive heart (Hebrews 8:10,11). This heart is soft and
responsive to the touch of God and delights in obeying the laws and commands
of the Lord. Paul, in his letter to the Ephesian believers, describes how
our ‘new self’ has been created to be like God in true righteousness and
holiness (Ephesians 4:24).
Truly, the heart of a Christian is a very special gift from God! But we
need to learn how to handle it. Otherwise, our new heart will also become
hardened and insensitive to God as a result of the sinful nature that is
living within us (Hebrews 3:12, 13).
Handling our Heart rightly:
1. The Heart needs DIRECTION.
Colossians 3:1- Since then you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts
on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
1 Peter 3:15- But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord.
Hebrews 3:1- Therefore, holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling,
fix your thoughts on Jesus....
Hebrews 12:2- Let us fix our eyes on Jesus.............
1 Chronicles 22:19- Now devote your heart and soul to seeking the Lord your
God.
Psalm 27:8- My heart says of You, "Seek His face!" Your face, Lord, I will
seek.
Psalm 119:36- Turn my heart toward Your statutes and not toward selfish
gain.
All these verses show how our hearts need to be fixed and focussed upon the
Lord and the things of God. We need to direct our hearts towards the Lord
and build our lives upon Him.
The Lord Jesus spoke very clearly and sternly about the heart:
Matthew 6:21- Where your treasure is, there your heart is.
What does this actually mean?
The treasure stands for what is valuable, precious and important to us.
The heart signifies our whole focus and attention.
Jesus is saying that our focus and attention will always be on what we
consider precious and important. So, we need to be careful about what we
give importance to, what our values are!
Consider how true this is in our everyday life:
Ask some people after a wedding what they liked about it. You will find
that all of them will give you different answers. One will say, “The
service was quite good!” Another will say, “The food was simply delicious!”
A third person will say, “Oh, the music was wonderful!” The fourth one will
probably say, “The bride and groom were really looking great!” And so on…..
Consider another example:
A musician standing before the Empire State Building in New York said to a
friend, “How beautifully that child across the street whistles.” His
companion was astonished. “How can you hear him in all this noise and sound
of heavy traffic?”
The musician, in response, threw a coin on the pavement. Immediately
several people who were walking along the street stopped and began to check
their pockets to see if it was their coin which had fallen.
The answer had been given. Everyone hears what interests him!
What do we understand from these examples?
It shows how the attention of people is immediately drawn to what they
consider important! If a person’s treasure is music, he will always be
caught up in it. If a person’s treasure is money, he will always be
thinking and living for it.
The apostle Paul says that what we are thinking about all the time reveals
where our heart is directed and what our treasure actually is! (Colossians
3:1 and 2)
If we need to know what our treasure is, all we need to do is check where
our focus is on all the time. Is our focus on our problems? On people? On
pleasures?
The heart cannot serve two masters (Matthew 6:24). Those who are
double-minded must grieve, mourn and wail before the Lord. As we thus
humble ourselves, God will give us grace to live with hearts that are
undivided and wholly devoted to Him (Psalm 86:11; James 4:4 to 10). The
reason that the Lord was angry with the Israelites was because they had
hearts that were continually going astray; they were never wholly devoted to
Him (Hebrews 3:10).
We need to lead our lives wholly unto the Lord! We need to relate to the
world and to people through Jesus. Everything we do must be from Him,
through Him and to Him (Romans 11:36)! As children of God, our goal must be
to please Him in all our ways (2 Corinthians 5:9). Jesus Christ must be our
‘immediate reality’!
2. The Heart needs INSTRUCTION.
Hebrews 8:10- I will put My laws in their minds and write them on their
hearts.
Deuteronomy 6:6- These commandments I give you today are to be upon your
hearts.
Psalm 40:8-Your law is within my heart.
Psalm 119:11- I have hidden Your Word in my heart that I might not sin
against You.
Isaiah 51:7- Hear me, you people who have My law in your hearts.
We need to feed the heart with instruction if we are to see it fulfilling
its God-given purpose. Make it a priority to meditate and feed upon the
Word of God. It must become more important to us than our daily food (Job
23:12).
We must keep reading it even when we don’t feel like it because the
Scriptures are like medicine. When we take a course of antibiotics, we don’
t feel its effect immediately. But that doesn’t stop us from taking the
treatment for the whole period of, say, five days. We still take it because
we know that it will make us better even though we don’t feel good
instantly. Similarly, a regular intake of God’s Word builds up a shield or
defence within us. We become strong in our inner man even without our
knowledge and when temptations or trials come the next time, we find that we
are able to stand up to them and overcome them.
We must not stop reading the Bible when we encounter difficult passages or
don’t understand certain verses. Too many people want instant revelation.
Well sorry, that does not always happen! Revelation comes by meditation!
So take the time to quietly ponder over such passages and ask the Spirit
for help and wisdom.
Mark 11:23 describes how we must not doubt in our hearts. Faith is in the
realm of the heart. When we focus upon the Lord and have His Word written
on our hearts, we become strong in faith! This verse also reveals that no
matter how much we ‘think faith’, ‘speak faith’ or ‘act faith’, our faith is
only as good as the condition or quality of our heart!
3. The Heart needs PURIFICATION.
1 Thessalonians 5:23- May God Himself, the God of peace sanctify you through
and through.
Matthew 5:8- Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
2 Timothy 2:22-. …call on the Lord out of a pure heart.
Psalm 139:23, 24- Search me, O God, and know my heart……See if there is any
offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.
The Lord is seeking people who are pure and honest in the depths of their
hearts. Lucifer was thrown out of heaven because he said ‘in his heart’
that he wanted to be like God (Isaiah 14:13, 14).
We need to take the time to wait in God’s presence and allow His Spirit to
search our hearts. As He exposes our hidden errors, faults, fears and
hurts, we must acknowledge it and ask for help and forgiveness. When we
read the Word, we must compare our life with it and apply the truths of the
Scriptures in the relevant areas.
Sin must be confessed the moment the Spirit convicts us. Don’t wait till
bedtime and pray generally, “Lord, please forgive me for all that I did
which was not pleasing to You today!” That is a lazy, insincere prayer and
is a mockery to God because He is always specific and clear in His dealings
with people!
Failure to deal with issues will allow our heart to get loaded with junk
just like rust gathers on an iron pipe. Very soon, our heart will be
covered with such filth that we will experience a gap in communion and
fellowship with the Lord. And then we will voice the common complaint, “I
don’t know what happened but I don’t have the same love, joy or commitment
that I had before!”
Be sensitive to the Spirit at all times and acknowledge sin as sin! Don’t
deny reality. That is what hypocrisy is all about!
4. The Heart needs PROTECTION.
Hebrews 3:12- Beware/See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful,
unbelieving heart that turns away from the Living God.
Proverbs 4:23- Above all else, guard your heart….
Luke 21:34- Be careful, or your hearts will be weighed down with
dissipation, drunkenness and the anxieties of life, and that day will close
on you unexpectedly like a trap.
John 13:2- The devil had already put into the heart of Judas Iscariot to
betray Jesus.
Acts 5:3- Then Peter said, “How is it that Satan has so filled your heart
that you have lied to the Holy Spirit…..?”
We are living in a world which is under the influence of the Devil. While
we cannot change the evil course or pattern followed in the world, we can
and should live above the worldly system.
A Christian should be careful about his entire lifestyle. Our hearts must
be kept free and protected from the wickedness of the world. We need to
consider ourselves as “heart patients”. Have you seen how a heart patient
lives? He is very careful about every aspect of his life: what goes into
his body and how he deals with his body. This is how we too must live, for
we also have a soft and fragile heart!
It has become a common practice in the world and sadly, even in Christian
circles, to play with sin and to talk lightly about sin. But sin is a very
serious issue. Well, how serious and terrible is sin? Sin is so serious
and terrible that it cost God to sacrifice His only Son!
5. The Heart needs EDIFICATION.
Ephesians 3:16, 17- I pray that out of His glorious riches, He may
strengthen you with power in the innerman (innermost being) so that Christ
may dwell (settle down, abide, make His permanent home) in your hearts.
Hebrews 13:9- It is good for our hearts to be strengthened by grace.
1 Peter 3:4, 5- Let yours be the inward adorning and beauty of the hidden
person of the heart. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put
their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful.
The Christian is only as handsome/beautiful as his/her heart! We need to
decorate ourselves on the inside. As believers, we need to be built up in
our inner man with power and grace so that the presence of Christ would
become an abiding reality. We need to daily examine our lives and check
whether Christ is really at home and comfortable with us. Or are we causing
Him to run 'helter-skelter' bombarding Him with constant pressure and
petitions?
1 Corinthians 14:4- He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself.
The Christian must seek God for this wonderful gift in order that he may use
it to build up his inner man. When we pray in tongues, our mind does not
understand it. But there is a work that takes place within us which brings
growth and transformation in our inner person.
Ephesians 4:29- Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but
only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that
it may benefit those who listen.
Hebrews 3:13- Encourage one another daily so that none of you may be
hardened by sin's deceitfulness.
As brothers and sisters in Christ, we have an awesome responsibility to
build up one another in Christ. We are called to speak words of
encouragement to people. We all have a prophetic calling in that we are
anointed to speak the rejuvenating and reviving word of God over people just
like Ezekiel was commanded to speak the word of the Lord over the dead and
dry people of Israel.
We need to build ourselves and others up constantly, for spiritual warfare
is continuous this side of Heaven. Our final and ultimate rest is only when
the Lord Jesus comes back in glory!
