Read Jeremiah 17:1-10
Notice the times in which the word "heart" is mentioned. When the Bible speaks of the heart, it doesn't usually mean the muscular organ that pumps blood around our bodies, it refers to the center of our personality, what has been called "the parliament of our lives."
The heart records sin (v.1). Others may never know what sins we have committed, but they leave permanent scars like bullet marks on a wall, on our inner lives. Sin leaves wounds which hurt.
The heart commits sin (v.5), because it governs our behavior. As we incline our heart, so we live and so we behave (Proverbs 23:7).
The heart produces sin (v.9), because basically it is tainted and corrupt, and no good thing can flow from it. Read Mark 7:21.
But God (ah, what a phrase), like some great heart specialist, understands the heart as no one else can (v.10). He alone can test it, diagnose it, and cure its complaint.
Verses 7 and 8 provide a refreshing contrast to this theme. Here, in a poetic form, the one who fears and loves God is described: a person with faith rooted deeply in the person of God; having rich supplies of nourishment from the water of His Word; possessing a calm, evergreen witness, providing shade and shelter for the passer by; producing abundant fruit in the form of Christian virtue and service.
Could your Christian witness be described as evergreen?
Help me daily, Lord, to draw from Your fullness all that my emptiness requires. By grace alone; in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Image: Jeremiah at the gate.
No comments:
Post a Comment