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Out of the Heart

Mat 12:34 Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.

Jesus states to the Pharisees the mouth speaks what’s in the heart। So, my question is what would this look like? Is it simply curses and foul speech? Would it be someone who speaks angrily to everyone around them? Both of these would be an aspect of this, but what about more subtle things? An example would be the person who, unknowingly, puts themselves first in front of others? Scripture says for us to place others needs in front of our on and in doing this He would meet our needs. What about some one who looks at what others do on the outside instead of searching out why the person is doing what they do? Scripture tells us that God sees what’s inside a mans heart and judges him by it.

There are many such examples I could write here. Hopefully, these are enough to get you to thinking about what comes out of your mouth as well as what is in your mind about others and how you treat them. If my thoughts and actions place me and my needs ahead of others then my heart is speaking clearly about where God ranks in my life. If I spend my days seeking what makes me comfortable instead of what God wants, my heart, again, is stating clearly where God ranks in my life. I challenge you to examine your thoughts and speech to see where God ranks in your life. Seek out those things that would suggest to you that your life is not resembling that of Christ and once you see them, commit them to prayer and continuously watch for them to come up until such a time that you no longer do them.

Make Daddy Proud

Through out our lives, we strive to make our parents proud of us. Even those of us who are raised by parents who abused us, still long to make them or the person we consider our parent, proud. As a child I always beemed when my dad would tell me I did good at something, and because of that feeling, I strove to do things to make him tell me that more often. "Father" only wishes for our good and for us to choose to love Him instead of ourselves. Shouldn't we want to make Him proud? In making Him proud, we achieve what we all long for in our lives. That is to have a parent who loves us and is proud of us. Why is it then that we call God, our "Father" yet do nothing to make Him proud of us? We seek to please ourselves instead of pleasing Him. I am most guilty of this in my life and how I wish I could say otherwise. Don't you think it is time we begin to try to make "Father" proud with our actions and our lives instead of making our flesh happy and satisfied? I do. I think its time we go back to the beginning and set our sites on the basics of our faith and learn anew how to trust in God for all we need and want and to strive to make a Daddy proud. Are you ready to have a proud Daddy?

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Discipleship

Luke 14:26 “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

John 15:18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

If we fear death or redicule or even what others think of us because of our walk with Christ then we can not be disciples of Christ.
In order for us to truly walk with christ we must die to ourselves and what the world thinks of us. In doing this we obtain the freedom to speak what “Father” wants spoken. Many people miss what is said to them by the Holy Spirit because of the fear they carry of what others think of them. Some simply ignore what is being said while others openly and willingly disobey what they are told to do or speak. It is time we, as the body of Christ, begin to listen to what the Holy Spirit is speaking to us in this hour that we may obtain our freedom and become true disciples of Jesus Christ.


The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Jn 15:18-19). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.

Fences to Freedom

Many of us grew up in households where we were told how worthless we are or how we would never amount to anything. In response to this we would build fences to protect ourselves from those who hurt us. Later in life as we meet new people and they, not knowing of our fences, cross those boundaries and hurt us. Again we build fences to protect ourselves. We keep building fences till one day no one can reach in to us because of all the wire and hurt we have.

C.S. Lewis talks of giving all of yourself to Christ in his book “Mere Christianity”. My question is how can we give all to Christ if we are hiding behind our fences? The answer is, it is not possible to give it all or in some cases even part of it to Him. Christ wants all we are and all we ever hope to become that He may make us into what He wanted us to be in the first place. In doing this He grants us true joy and peace in all we do and through all of life’s good and bad times. The only way we can obtain this is to begin to climb those fences and take a chance on our hearts running free and beginning to care once again about ourselves and people in more than a what can you do for me fashion. Once we climb those fences and get from behind them we can give all there is of ourselves to Christ and He will give all there is of Himself to us.