The Human Heart! One of the most miraculous organs we have. Not only is it designed to flow the life forces throughout our body, but it also is a strange a mysterious thing reflected in a concept to God.
For instance, the bible mentions the heart over 700 times. In those, it is always mentioned where God is concerned and what man is to do.
I’m sure you have heard the statement “Matters of the Heart!” Have you wondered why that is? The heart is absolutely the focal point of who we are and where our decisions start from.
Unlike Western cultures, which primarly associated the heart with feelings and emotions, Eastern culture emphasized its role on thinking, reasoning and planning. The heart characterizes humans first and foremost as “Rational beings” that are susceptible to teaching and learning, which is something God has directed each of us to do.
A very important concept here that begs to be mentioned is when we disconnect spiritually, we become what the bible calls ‘she’ol’ the netherworld, to which the soul is headed.
From the very beginning when original sin came into the world man has always tried to blame someone else for indulging sin. Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent. Today people look to godless organizations to help them explain their bondages to willful sin. Some have actually blamed God for supposedly making them a certain way.
The reading today from the Gospel of Mark gives us an interesting glimpse of the Heart of Man, in how we each can relate and locate the source of all our problems.
“For from within, out of the hearts of people, come the evil thoughts, acts of sexual immorality, thefts, murders, acts of adultery, deeds of greed, wickedness, deceit, indecent behavior, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile the person.”
Just reading these verses, really makes us scratch our heads, just how bad are we in matters of the heart and our slavery to sin? Without even diving further into scripture, we get a clear and accurate picture of just how much ‘sin’ is involved in every action we take.
In the Christian journey, do we not try and re-calibrate ourselves to God's likeness, will, and even God's own heart? Did not God say “David was a man after his own heart?” Why? How could a sinful King David, be a man after Gods own heart?
A lawyer, that was not a Christian attended a church service and listened so carefully to the testimonies of some of the members of the church. Of these members, the lawyer knew most of them, how their shady and un-honest behaviors in doing his work as a lawyer.
At the end of the service a man came to the lawyer and asked him “How did you like the testimonies?” The lawyer replied, “To a lawyer there is a vast difference between testimony and evidence.” Here we see how words are cheap, and it is perilously easy to give a fine-sounding testimony for Christ, but quite another matter to demonstrate evidence of God’s purifying power in our lives through Christ. The Gospel of Mark state, “These people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.”
Having the heart of God! That is probably one of the most profound statements that any Christian could conjure up!
Another real fact is when we have other facits on our mind that tend to take over, we absolutely lose focus and are easy strayed away. Does not scripture tell us “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also?”
Until you get it right in the heart, nothing has happened to you yet! Your focus, your priorities and even your family may be in your realm, but it is what you have in your heart that emerges and your life begins to give expression to it. Everything starts with the state of your heart, which is why your heart's condition is very critical to God. Hence the reason why God declared David was a man after his own heart! God looked at Davids's heart, where man looks more on appearances.
Although, sin separates us from God, but that does not separate us from his LOVE! Does not paul tell us in Romans, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
If you look at the beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew, you will see the main focus of these, are of the state of our heart! Think about this! We see that God is telling us that our blessedness was not determined by what we did but by how we regard situations. It all comes down to the heart!
In the parallel climax to this, just a few verses earlier in the Gospel of Mark that was read today, “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.” Did you hear that? Everything God made was good, but listen to this “Therefore, ridding yourselves of all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not just hearers who deceive themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was.”
A rather disturbing fact is a person can forget who they once were! In a rather pickle of a problem, we find here that the heart directly relates to what we take in. What we listen to, what we read, what we acknowledge! However, it does not stop there.
I remember in my youth, I was exposed to watching horror movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th and so on. During my childhood, I developed a fear for the dark, when things was quiet, I started to be fearful and when hearing weird and erie sounds. It’s the mere fact that what I was exposed to, directly hit the nerve that sparked fear, anxiety and panic. As I got older, and after experiencing war, I can’t even watch most action movies. Only wholesome and lovely shows. Anything negative, I fully disregard! Why? Because my heart changed! We each change! But guess what; its not what comes in us that make the change, its what comes out!
Jesus tells us this, “Listen to Me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside the person which can defile him if it goes into’ him; but the things which come out of the person are what defile the person.”
Where are we to go and what are we to do for matters of the heart? Go to God!
You see, everything, your fault, my fault, nobody's fault, that enters the body by different means, is subject to our final decision to make on how to respond to it. Not just what we see or hear, but all aspects of what we are exposed to, including sin. The sin that we each are scourging down the trenches of life in every area we choose to follow.
Scripture tells us clearly, “Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” When we make efforts half-heartedly, it becomes worthless! Has no value! We have to give all we are into what God has already provisioned us to be; which is a likeness to Christ!
Take every thought captive to Christ is what needs clearly understood. When we have a deceptive, sinful heart, the only way to rid ourselves into going down the wrong path is everything we intake must be filtered through Christ. That in turn will affect and grow our hearts to be more like God.
Is our heart reserved for Christ Only?
It was once reported that when Queen Victoria was in Scotland, she stopped at a cottage of a poor woman, sitting for a few minutes in an old arm chair. When the Queen left, one of the members of the party told the woman who the visitor was. The old woman was in awe by the thought of the honor which the Queen visit her with such regard and humility. The women then too the arm chair, placed it into another room and always made regard to it when she received visitors “No one shall ever sit in that chair again, because my Queen sat in it.”
How much more sacredly should we keep from another occupancy the place in our heart where Christ has been received as the guest! Is there any need for Christ to come with His whip of cords to drive out the traders, the sellers or cattle and doves, and the money changes in our heart?
In closing, friends, the matters of the heart, which is the Heart of Man, shall always be with us. Who we are by way of the heart, is who we are period! When our heart is not well, our Spirit will follow!
As it is written in the Psalms “with my whole heart do I seek you Lord!”
That is what each of us needs to do, every single day! Not just when we are in sour circumstances, but in every area of our lives!
If we say to God, "I give you my heart..." Maybe we should say, "God, give me Your heart." Let our heart beat with the heartbeat of God...Let our heart be broken by what breaks Gods heart..." Amen