Time to Reexamine
Matters of the Heart • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
The heart is a vital bodily organ. If your heart stops beating, you die. Your doctor will listen to your heart every time she examines you. Doctors listen for any abnormal rhythm of the valves and blood flow. If that rhythm is not the way it needs to be, other tests are done to make sure the heart is functioning properly. You might even go on to say that if your heart health is not good, your whole health is not good.
In the Bible, the word heart is used not only for the physical bodily organ, but it also includes all functions of the brain and nervous system. The Hebrew word is leb and the Greek word is kardia. It occurs approximately 1000 times in the Bible. If a word or subject occurs once in the Bible, in my mind it is important. If it occurs ten times, I think we need to pay attention to it. However, it the word occurs a thousand times, I better do more than just pay attention! I need to examine closely and strive to understand its meaning totally.
The design of the Biblical heart gives us multiple meanings. Physically, as we have already mentioned, it shows life or death. Food and drink affect the heart as scripture shows is can “faint” or “tremble.”
wine that gladdens the heart of man,
oil to make his face shine,
and bread that sustains his heart.
The position of the heart from a Biblical perspective is one of being the center.
Above all else, guard your heart,
for it is the wellspring of life.
It is also defined from a psychological perspective. Many references show that the heart attends intellectually, it perceives, it understands, it debates, it reflects, it remembers and it is wise or can be mad. You can find a good Bible dictionary and see the references for all these and much more.
From an emotional standpoint, the heart can experience gladness, joy, sorrow, anguish, bitterness,despair, and love.
The Bible tells us that the heart reveals purpose.
Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait till the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men’s hearts. At that time each will receive his praise from God.
The design of the heart also in the seat of mankind’s nature, character and disposition. However, for our purposes today, we are going to look that the heart as the hidden part that is known fully to God and His Son Jesus.
“I the Lord search the heart
and examine the mind,
to reward a man according to his conduct,
according to what his deeds deserve.”
The heart is the seat of our knowledge of God. We can have all the knowledge of God and understand all the facts about who He is and what He does. But, until we understand Him in and with our hearts, we are not experiencing His fullness. The heart brings forth our response to the vision of God.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.
God, His Son Jesus, and the Holy Spirit dwell in the believer’s heart once that person invites them to come in and do so.
set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.”
My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
Your face, Lord, I will seek.
On the other hand, when a person does not allow God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit to dwell in one’s heart, it becomes darkened, sinful and as we will see in our text for today, sick
A great description of this can be found in Isaiah 1:5-6.
Why should you be beaten anymore?
Why do you persist in rebellion?
Your whole head is injured,
your whole heart afflicted.
From the sole of your foot to the top of your head
there is no soundness—
only wounds and welts
and open sores,
not cleansed or bandaged
or soothed with oil.
The Context Made
The Context Made
Whenever you look at scripture, it always pays to look at the context. Sometimes the context goes beyond the verses that surround a particular passage. In the case of this passage, we need to understand the background of what has happened. Chapters 1-39 of the Book of Isaiah are historically set in the 8th Century. The Prophet Isaiah lived in a troubled time with everything that was seemly secure was all of the sudden coming loose. Three hundred years prior, David had pulled the people together and they lived in a time of security and were devoted to God. Following David’s time, the kingdom began to fall apart as military struggles, wickedness and false worship begin to creep into the society. Tumultuous times led the people to think that perhaps other gods were better than the one true God. The people of Judah came under the control the Assyrians.
God chose Isaiah to be His voice. God inspired many prophets to use writings to communicate His message to a world that had rejected God’s ways.
The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
The prophet of God calls out the people of God.
Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth!
For the Lord has spoken:
“I reared children and brought them up,
but they have rebelled against me.
The context is made by the prophet of God for the people of God for the purpose of God. In fact, the context that is made is declared in the prophet’s name, Isaiah. Isaiah means, “the Lord shall save.” Do you see how the context makes it much more clear? We will see how this context made turns in the the conceptual message.
We know from Ephesians 3:11b that “God’s eternal purpose was accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God’s eternal purpose was to once and for all to take care of the condition of mankind’s heart.
The Conceptual Message
The Conceptual Message
The declaration in verses 5-6 give a picture of mankind’s sinfulness. God had been a Father to the people, yet they did not know Him. They used elaborate worship rites to establish religion yet had no relationship. They had become satisfied with outward observance without inner character. The direction, demeanor and disgust of the heart proved to be the cause of this lack of relationship with God.
The direction of the heart was moving away from God.
Isaiah 1:5 had a phrase that indicates the punishment for sin. It stems from the idea that a beating would resolve the issue at hand.
Blows and wounds cleanse away evil,
and beatings purge the inmost being.
However, we see that while the beatings purge the inmost being, there is nothing about restoration the the people, according to Isaiah 1:5, persisted in rebellion. We have always been a rebellious human race. We rebelled in the Garden of Eden.
Who were they who heard and rebelled? Were they not all those Moses led out of Egypt?
The condition of our inmost being, the condition of our hearts leads us to continue to be a rebellious people. We want to do things our way. That is our demeanor. Our conduct, our behavior, tend to be prideful and we think our way is best. Our demeanor exalts self instead of God.
Jesus spoke about this.
For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
This kind of thinking, where we think more of ourselves than we should, is a condition of the heart that affects our entire being. Isaiah tells us that our head is injured, which means our capacity to think Godly thoughts is damaged. Our whole heart is afflicted, the Bible says, which in turn messes up our whole body.
From the sole of your foot to the top of your head
there is no soundness—
only wounds and welts
and open sores,
not cleansed or bandaged
or soothed with oil.
No “soundness.” A deep dive into the meaning of that word and means there is no completion of the design that was intended. The Psalmist summed it up this way:
Because of your wrath there is no health in my body;
my bones have no soundness because of my sin.
What a disgusting place to be. To be created for so much more, yet the condition of the heart prevents soundness.
Isaiah says there is only wounds, welts, and open sores that have not been cleansed or bandaged or soothed with oil.
What condition is the condition of your heart? Truth be known, we are all from head to toe a bid ole mess because of the condition of our hearts. But....there are some corrective measures!
The Corrective Measures
The Corrective Measures
When a heart is messed up, we go to see our Doctor. The doctor’s desire is that we are healed and made whole. Isaiah shared the same question that Jeremiah would ask later on:
Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then is there no healing
for the wound of my people?
We have a Great Physician in and through the Lord God Almighty! He longs for His people to be whole and healed. He desires hearts that are pure and clean. We should boldly pray the prayer of David:
James 1:20 tells us that God desires righteousness for His followers.
This is why we see later on in this first chapter of Isaiah the picture of God’s desire.
“Come now, let us reason together,”
says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.
God designates His plan for us.
“I will be a Father to you,
and you will be my sons and daughters,
says the Lord Almighty.”
Then God gives us a plan for deliverance.
Isaiah announces this plan in Isaiah 1:25-26.
I will turn my hand against you;
I will thoroughly purge away your dross
and remove all your impurities.
I will restore your judges as in days of old,
your counselors as at the beginning.
Afterward you will be called
the City of Righteousness,
the Faithful City.”
We learn more how He does this in the New Testament when Paul wrote:
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
The Great Physician has a desire, a designation and a plan of deliverance for those of us who have messed up hearts. However, He is One that practices democracy in a way. You see, He gives a remedy for our heart condition, but we have to be the ones that choose His plan.
The invitation is simple yet so beautiful. Let’s revisit verse 18 of Isaiah 1.
“Come now, let us reason together,”
says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
they shall be like wool.
God does not say it is automatic or you and I are already there. His invitation is “come.” He gives us the choice to enter His presence or to walk away.
Though your sins be so disgusting, and the direction of your heart has pulled you away, God still says, “Come.” Though your sins be like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.
How’s your heart today? There are some thing you can do to make it better.
Application
Application
What does your spiritual heart look like?
Is it strong or do you need to strengthen it more?
How might you do that starting today?