What’s in your heart?
“A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” Luke 6:45
The words we speak in life are very important. In fact, they are directing and steering the course of our life. It’s true, you can verify this principle simply by taking a look at where you are in your life and identifying when you stated speaking the words that made the decisions to place you where you live and work today. According to this verse in Luke, we speak out of what is in our heart in abundance. Consider this: what we allow our heart to feed on are the things and attitudes that are growing inside of us and going to come out of our mouth. This is one of the reasons it is so important to feed on the Word of God. If I continually feast on the things of the world, that is what I will sound like and imitate. Especially when pressure is on, whatever is in my heart will be magnified greatly when I am stressed and put to the test.
When Jesus was on the cross, He said, “Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34) Talk about pressure! He was under the greatest amount of stress of all time, yet it was clear that love and forgiveness were in His heart. Even though He had been wrongly accused, beaten, and then nailed to a cross, these words showed that He had no ill will in His heart toward any of His accusers or executioners. His heart was pure and full of the love of God. That didn’t just happen by accident. He purposefully kept Himself unspotted from the world and even though He spent a lot of time with the people of the world He never allowed Himself to take on their attitude or words. He only spoke what He heard from His Father through the Holy Spirit.
Because I used to work in the world and spend a lot of time around people who are far from God, I know how easy it can be to take on the complaints and sarcasm of those around you. It’s almost like you cannot fit in if you don’t have that same outlook. However, if you don’t allow those around you to influence you but commit to keeping your heart and thoughts unspotted, you will begin to enrich the hearts of those you are with instead of their toxic words corrupting you. They will begin to see the light in you because you don’t speak and think like they do, but you let the love of God direct your words.
Today, I encourage you to fill up your heart with the words, thoughts and attitude of your heavenly Father. You can do this by meditating on His Word which is His thoughts in written form. As you meditate and learn the heart of God through His word, you will begin to take on His love and compassion for those you are around each day. In that way when those around you speak all manner of evil, take on the attitude of Jesus and say, “Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.” Then be the light wherever you are and lead others to the love of God through the treasure you have deposited into your heart, that is His Word.
Today’s scripture reading: Luke 6:43-49
43 “For a good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.
44 For every tree is known by its own fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush.
45 A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.
46 “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do the things which I say?
47 Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like:
48 He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock.
49 But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the stream beat vehemently; and immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great.”
The Daily Dose 