By Staff
True religion is a matter of the heart, the inner life, the soul. We are told in the Old Testament book of 1 Samuel, chapter 16, verse 7b, "The LORD does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."
We must face the fact that God knows the innermost secrets of our heart and sees into the deepest recesses of our soul.
The Apostle Paul tells us in the epistle to the Romans, chapter 10, verse 9, that "if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." Salvation requires heart belief.
The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah confronts us with the fact that our heart is deceitful, desperately wicked, and beyond knowing (Jeremiah 17:9).
The sum is, God knows our heart; we do not. God does not leave us in the dark about this matter. There are heart indicators, detectives, if you will, we can look to so we can know the condition of our heart.
Jesus gives us a clue to our heart condition in the gospel of Matthew, chapter 12, verse 34b, "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." The mouth is the outlet of the heart. It is the overflow. What is abundant in our heart is evident in our speech. Most of us do not monitor closely what we say, but if we did, we would have an accurate indication of what is in our heart.
Is your heart filled with "what if's," indicating discontent? Always hoping and wondering about what might have been, rather than accepting and embracing what is. Somebody said that poverty and obscurity is easier to handle than prosperity and applause.
Are there "if only's" being uttered, that indicate a heart chafing against certain circumstances beyond control? A bitter heart kicks against the people around us and leads us to alienate ourselves from those closest to us.
Jesus gave us another clue about heart condition in Matthew, chapter 6, verse 21: "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." What we value has our heart. If we inventory our lives like keys on a ring, taking each key one at a time, evaluating what we are willing to lay aside or give away, how many keys would we desperately cling to? Everything in our life that we are grasping tightfisted is something we treasure and has captured the affections of our heart.
The detectives of the heart are the Word of God, ministered to our heart by the Spirit of God. If we ask God to search our heart like David did in Psalms, chapter 139, verses 23-24 ("Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties; and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."), God will search and reveal.
The Holy Scriptures give us vivid examples of people with spiritual heart problems. In 1 Samuel, chapter 25, verses 2-37, we read of the covetous, selfish heart of Nabal. The "what if" heart of Demas is revealed in 2 Timothy, chapter 4, verse 10, and we see the bitter "if only" heart of Esau in Hebrews, chapter 12, verses 15-16.
A bad heart will bring us down. We must let the detectives of the Bible do their work. And then we must heed the directive of Solomon in Proverbs, chapter 4, verse 23: "Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life." We keep our heart by appropriating the grace of God for every bad attitude and every misplaced value.
So we must turn ourselves in to the heart detectives. When their investigation is complete, we must be treated by Dr. Grace. Then, we must live a rigid discipline of guarding our heart against all invasive detriments.
Everybody and everything including God is after our heart. We choose whom we give it to.