A Matter Of The Heart

But the Lord said to Samuel, 'Do not consider his appearance or his height, for at the outward appearance or His height, for I have rejected him.  The lord does not look at the things man looks at.  Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the height - 1 Samuel 16:17 (NIV)

 
The Bible gives us many assurances of God's providence and care for us His children.  How do we appropriate what God has for us?  As someone says - The heart of the matter is a matter of the heart .  So, what matters most to God—true beliefs, right actions, proper worship, the beauty of appearance, or purity of heart?  What does the Bible mean by 'heart'?  How can hearts be changed?

 
There are many things which are important in religion.  This consists of

(1) What one believes in – that is doctrines, beliefs, theology;

(2) What one does in terms of ones actions, conduct, works, morals, ethics;

(3) How one feels sincere, good, bad, and indifferent;

(4) How one worships – that is whether one is involved with ritual, liturgy, tradition;

(5) Public appearance; etc.
 
Spiritually, what is essential to true religion is simply the condition of one's heart. Is it open or closed, contrite or stubborn, soft like a pillow or hard like a stone?  ' The sacrifice God wants is a broken spirit.  God, you will not reject a heart that is broken and sorry for sin' as we read in Psalm 51:17. What does the Bible mean by 'heart'?  It is said that there are three Hebrew words and equivalent Greek terms for ' heart ' which appear over 850 times in the Old and New Testaments and that rarely do they refer to the physical organ that pumps blood (except in 1 Samuel 25:37 and 2 Kings 9:24 in reference to paralysis or death when the heart stops).  Generally, it is meant as a metaphor for the spiritual organ of the core self.  In biblical psychology, the heart is the innermost spirit of personal life; the source of all thoughts and plans, attitudes and desires, motives and choices; the deep seat of the intellect, emotions and will.

 
1.  The Seat of Intellect : The heart is the centre of cognitive and imaginative processes, in both Hebrew and Greek conception.  In many traditional translations of the Bible, heart is used to refer to the:

 
• Mind - 1 Chronicles 29:9
• Knowledge - Ecclesiastics 8:16
• Understanding - Job 12:3
• Discernment - 1 Kings 3:9
• Memory - Proverbs 3:3
 
Knowing God involves the spiritual, non-material mind, which is in the heart.

 
2.  The Seat of Emotions:  The heart can be:
• Happy - Proverbs 27:11, Acts 14: 17
• Sad - Nehemiah 2:2
• Troubled - John 12:27
• At Peace - Colossians 3:15
• Courageous - 2 Samuel 17:10
• Fearful - Isaiah 35:11
• Discouraged - Numbers 32:7
• Envious - Proverbs 23:17
• Generous - 2 Chronicles 29:31
• Proud - Deuteronomy 8:14
• Pure - Matthew 5:8
• It can be moved by compassion - Luke 7:13
• Hardened by hatred - Leviticus 19:17
• The heart can be burned by spiritual vitality - Luke 24:32

• Grow cold with indifference - Revelation 2:4, 5
Jesus clearly states that ' The mouth speaks the things that are in the heart'

 - Matthew 12:34
 
3. The Seat of the Will :  A person's character is determined by the condition of his or her heart.  The heart can be:

 
• Stubborn - 2 chronicles 36:13
• Steady - Psalm 108:1
• Desperately wicked - Jeremiah 17:9
• Broken and contrite - depending on its fundamental response to God – Psalm 51.

 
The heart is the centre where decisions, obedience, intentionality, and devotion are formed.  It is where conversation and communication take place.  What God wants is what John Wesley called the 'perfection of the will'—human hearts transformed and made responsive to grace, overflowing with love for God, neighbour, and oneself.  Hearts that have hardened to human need and grown cold to divine love can soften; warm; change; and be renewed (and sometimes even replaced), through the gracious gift of God as the Lord says in Ezekiel 36:24-28 (NIV) – 'I will take you from the nations and gather you out of all the lands and bring you back into your own land.  Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean.  I will cleanse you from all your uncleanness and all your idols.  Also, I will teach you to respect me completely, and I will put a new way of thinking inside you.  I will take out the stubborn hearts of stone from your bodies, and I will give you obedient hearts of flesh.  I will put my spirit inside you and help you live by my rules and carefully obey my laws.  You will live in the land I gave to my ancestors, and you will be my people, and I will be your God.'  'We believe with our hearts, and so we are made right with God' - Romans 10:10.   However, the condition of a person's heart is known only to God.  To be human is to make judgments based on external criteria: what one believes, how one behaves, and the way one appears.  But God sees beneath the surface to the heart of the matter.  For example, when the Lord was seeking someone after His own heart to be king of Israel, he sent Samuel to the house of Jesse.  After examining all the externally qualified candidates, who the Lord rejected, the prophet found a young shepherd boy, David.  That is when it revealed to them that 'God does not see the same way people see.  People look at the outside of a person, but the Lord looks at the heart -1 Samuel 16:7.

 
Scripture sometimes uses the term 'heart' in a deeper sense, to refer not only to a person's inner thoughts, emotions and volition, but to a sacred sphere within the core self which is immortal. 'Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight – 1 Peter 3:4.   St. Augustine called it a God-shaped vacuum, and said 'hearts restless till they find there rest in thee.'  The heart, in this sense, is that deeper spiritual point of contact with the Divine, roughly equivalent to spirit—as in Psalm 51:10 .  In this more mystical understanding, the heart is that which speaks directly with God (Psalm 27:8), and is subject to divine revelation, influence and activity – Romans 2:15; Acts 15:9 .

 
In mysterious ways, God can;
• Harden hearts – Exodus 4:21
• Change them into responsive vessels of His will – Ezra 6:22.

• God can put fear into human hearts – Jeremiah 32:40

• Inspire them for His purposes – Nehemiah 2:12
 
The Devil has similar access to the human heart: he persuaded Judas to turn against Jesus – John 13:2 ; and possessed Ananias to lie to the Spirit and to the Church – Acts 5:3 .

 
To Ponder: What is your heart like?  Does God see it as one that is totally transparent and usable?  I like what Sadhu Sundar Singh says: The capital of Heaven is the heart in which Jesus Christ is enthroned as King.  Let Christ Jesus sit on the throne of your heart so that God can use you as His agent of change.                   

 
This article was inspired by an article in the Everyday Study of the CEV Bible.

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