Tag Archives: Guarding our hearts

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Guard Your Heart

“Oh, that just breaks my heart!”

Lately I have found myself saying this frequently. When I hear about a young person ending their life, acts of racial hatred, persecution of fellow believers for their faith in Jesus, these all touch me to the core and break my heart. There is so much hurt and suffering in the world.

Our Women’s Community Bible Study has been studying “The Son of David: Seeing Jesus in the Historical Books” by Nancy Guthrie. One of the themes repeated in these Old Testament historical books is the pattern of ignoring God’s commandments and the resulting suffering that ensues. One of the ladies in our community Bible study said “where minds focus, hearts follow”. That struck me profoundly. When my mind strays from my first love – Jesus – my heart follows resulting in actions that are sin. As a follower of Jesus I must guard my heart.

That leads to the question – where is my mind focusing?

I can fill my mind with all sorts of things, some good, some clearly bad, and some things that start out good yet become bad as those things take up too much space. If I think of my mind as a container of thoughts and images, the content is constantly changing as I go through any given day. Thoughts and images are crowded out as new ones are taken in. As I make choices about what I focus on – consciously or unconsciously – my mind is forming ideas, attitudes, responses that ALL affect the disposition of my heart.

If I spend significant time on social media, podcasts, streaming news sites, on-line shopping sites, etc. – all these will fill my mind and take up room that could be filled with spiritually beneficial thoughts and images.

Paul cautions us in Philippians 4: 8-9 ESV

8 And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. 9 Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.

Paul is encouraging the Christians in Philippi and says – “One final thing”… so it must be important! Paul asks us to “fix our minds” – focus – on what is

TRUE

HONORABLE

RIGHT

PURE

LOVELY

ADMIRABLE

EXCELLENT

WORTHY OF PRAISE

I found the Amplified Bible translation of verse 8 especially meaningful.

8 Finally, believers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable and worthy of respect, whatever is right and confirmed by God’s word, whatever is pure and wholesome, whatever is lovely and brings peace, whatever is admirable and of good repute; if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think continually on these things [center your mind on them, and implant them in your heart].

How practical! For instance if my thoughts are “right and confirmed by God’s Word” then I can trust those thoughts. If I am anxious and worried, then I am certainly not focusing on things that are “lovely and bring peace”. Yet what about the reality of suffering the loss of a loved one, the pain of illness or accident? Am I expected to ignore the reality of that suffering? No.

Paul says in II Corinthians 10:4

4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,

Paul challenges us here to “take every thought captive to obey Christ”. The suffering is real and suffering is the result of living in a broken and fallen world. Yet the TRUTH of God’s plan to redeem everything, including each of us, gives us hope. Until we eventually experience that full redemption our responsibility is to align our thoughts with God’s word to guard our hearts and minds.

This is the challenge for each of us moment by moment – day by day. As my friend said – “where our minds focus our hearts will follow.” My heart will still break at the suffering all around me. Yet when I fix my mind on God’s sovereignty and implant His Word in my mind, my heart will follow.

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Not Out of Danger, Yet

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Last Year’s Blooms

I just went outside and covered my newest hydrangea bush with a large, upside down planter. It is supposed to frost tonight and be a bit colder again. I don’t want the blooms, which set early on this variety, to freeze. They are not out of danger yet.

The older, larger bushes of hydrangeas we have will just have to tough it out – they are too big to cover effectively. They are also mature and have weathered colder winters than this one. They are weather hardened.

When our children were young, we felt it was our job as parents to protect our children from harmful influences. We limited and censored TV watching, evaluated the books they checked out from the library for age appropriateness, and monitored who they played with.

As our children got older and hopefully matured, we allowed them more freedom to choose what they watched, read, and who they spent time with. Sometimes they made good choices, sometimes they didn’t. Yet each decision was an opportunity to grow and learn. They became “hardened” by the consequences of those decisions.

As a gardener, I have planted new annuals when I thought all threat of frost was past.

Sometimes they were “not out of danger” and I had to try to cover and protect them, even though I thought they were safe when I planted them.

Sometimes we do this spiritually. We think we have won enough battles, overcome a particular sin and we can sit back and “just live”.

I can remember thinking, “If we can just get our children through high school….”          Ha! how wrong I was!

Paul warns against this dangerous attitude. In I Corinthians 10: 12-13 he says –

12 So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.

We must always be on guard in our hearts and minds and recognize that we are “not out of danger yet.” Someday we will be, when we meet Jesus face to face.

Until then we must be vigilant and on guard.

 

 

In My Garden with God  #17

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It’s the Heart That Matters

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I was talking with my friend, Carol, about parenting as Christians. At our age, we are done with active parenting. We each have grandchildren who we love deeply and pray for consistently. We now look back on our own parenting and realize the mistakes we made and wish we had known then….what we know now.

But, that is just the point isn’t it?

We couldn’t know then what we know now, because we see differently from this end.

One thing we agreed on, we wouldn’t focus so much on the “little things”. We spent a lot of time making sure that our children DID certain things. Some of that was important, but now other things seem more significant.

Like our children’s hearts.

In the Bible dictionary it defines the heart as the “central or most vital part of something.” YES! That is what Carol and I realized was most important in Christian parenting – focusing on the heart.

  • Where was my daughter’s heart when she pulled her sister’s hair?
  • Where was my son’s heart when he laughed at his brother who fell?
  • Where were their hearts when they excluded a younger sibling?
  • Where were their hearts when they lied or blamed others for what they did?

45 A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart.         Luke 6:45

It is the heart that matters.

Proverbs 4:23 says it so plainly –

23 Guard your heart above all else,
    for it determines the course of your life.

A child’s words, tone of voice, and facial expressions are windows into their hearts. We must pay attention and strive to touch their hearts so they sense God’s unconditional love for them. That love is what will draw them unto Jesus. “For God so loved the world….” God has designed our hearts to desire relationship with Him. We can help our children open their hearts to God so their hearts are not hardened. Worship, Bible study, fellowship, and prayer will help hearts be open to God.

As a grandparent I am praying that God will guard their hearts from the fiery darts of the evil one. I must be an example of one who has a heart for God.

This prayer from Paul is my prayer for my grandchildren –

18 I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those he called—his holy people who are his rich and glorious inheritance.

It’s the heart that matters.