For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

                                                     -Matthew 6:21 NIV

In the past weeks, I created a blog post entitled “What It Means To Me To Be A Christian.”  It was a synopsis of my experience on the surface as a follower of Christ.  It is my simple answer, and there is really so much more to it than that.  I love Proverbs 20:5 NIV which tells us:

“The purposes of a person’s heart are deep waters,
but one who has insight draws them out.”

There is something about our hearts that is very deep, and to ponder the heart means that we will be walking out into the deep to understand it.  There is so much that we can find hidden within our hearts, oftentimes, a lot of what is there can be very painful to face.  I believe that this is often why we stay busy and don’t search our hearts, because what we face can be dark and cold.  When we draw out those “purposes” that Proverbs 20:15 NIV speaks about, what we find is a reflection of who we really are.  That reflection cannot be hidden or covered up.  There are usually signs that we miss that reveals the true condition of our hearts.  In Matthew 15:18 NIV, Jesus says, “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart…”

This was Jesus’ response to the Pharisees who were seeking to trap him.  He responds by referring to a prophesy recorded by Isaiah,

“‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’”

-Matthew 15:7 NIV

The Pharisees were leading the people astray by their teachings.  As a result, the people were honoring and worshiping God “in vain”.  I find it very interesting that despite what the Scriptures foretold, the Pharisees still sought to trap and kill Jesus.  This was evidence of the state of their hearts.

I am by no means bringing this to light to judge as that is just what the Pharisees were doing.  It is up to us to search our own hearts and find those “purposes” in our hearts.  Those purposes are two things, a purpose that we formed by our experiences in this world and a purpose that was placed there by God.  What the Bible tells us is that we should seek out those purposes so that our hearts can heal and so that God’s purpose can be revealed in us.

Simply put, becoming a follower of Christ is a heart matter and an act of surrender.  It is not the kind of surrender you might see on a cartoon when a character waves a white flag.  It is an admission to yourself and to God that you live in darkness and choose to walk in the light.  What is the light?  Walking in the light means that you let everything be exposed to God so that it can be placed into his very compassionate and merciful hands— our cares, our worries, our mistakes, our anger, our hatred, our selfishness, our unforgiveness, our bitterness, and even our deepest, darkest secrets; these are all burdens, and your acts in them are sin.  This is what the Pharisees could have done but refused because they had their own beliefs and agendas.  Even though they sought to trap Jesus so they could justify his crucifixion, they still could have found entrance into the light and found forgiveness for their wicked plots to kill Jesus.  Jesus wants to carry our burdens, because the weight of those burdens are too great for us to endure.

So nothing can change without a heart-change, and that cannot start without God’s help in searching the deep water of our hearts.  Once we do, everything comes into the light of God where miraculous things can happen.  We can experience deliverance from addictions, from broken hearts, from oppression, depression and so much more.  It is a place where miracles happen.

Go forth and be blessed, my friend.