How is Your Heart? (2)

Hows your heart?

FCF: Mans heart is deceitful and desperately wicked above all things.

Matt. 15:1-20

Introduction:

In asking this question, I am not asking about the physical condition of your heart, though I pray everyone’s heart here this morning is physically OK. I am asking this question in reference to the spiritual condition of your heat. So again, I ask, how is your heart? Do you have a heart for God? Do you pursue God with all your heart? Or, is your heart attracted to the world?

This morning, I would like to examine our hearts, taking a look at it through the BTI (Biblical Truth Imagining). Today, I would like to take God’s Word and use the truth found in it to examine your life and see if your actions and attitudes resemble your words and worship.

I) You Speak as if you know God (v8a)

a) You know what to Pray (draweth nigh)

In Luke 18:10-12 we have a perfect example of someone that, to others, sounds like he has it all together.

Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. 11 The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. 12 I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.

You may speak the language, but that is all you have in common with God.

b) You know how to Praise(with their mouth)

You know how to pray and you may know how to praise Him, but just because you can speak like you know God does not mean you know Him. The pharisees knew how to pray and how to praise him. There are many quote un-quote Christians that know how to pray and even more that THINK they know how to praise him but truth be told they know nothing about him.

II) You speak to others as if you love God (v8b)

a) You know scripture

Jobs friends at first had all the right words for the situation. They knew what to say to explain Jobs situation.

The Pharisees knew a lot of scripture, people thought they had the answers to everything. People may even come to you for advice, but just because you know what to say does not mean you know God.

You have a head knowledge not a heart knowledge.

Mark 7:6 KJV 1900

He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

Isaiah 29:13 KJV 1900

Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, And with their lips do honour me, But have removed their heart far from me, And their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men:

b) You Know traditions

Again, the Pharisees not only knew the scriptures they knew what traditions were needed at certain times throughout the year. You know exactly what to do and what to say at the right times of certain aspects of worship. You may be so familiar with how the church service should run that you could do it with your eyes closed. Knowing this does not make you right with God!

You may be the one that knows all the right things to say to someone when it comes to soul winning. Co-workers may be impressed at just how much you know about God. People in the church may have an impression of you that you love God more then anyone else just by the way you sing or by the way you testify, but having all the right things to say does not classify you as a man/woman after Gods own heart.

III) But, you live as if you hate God (v8c)

Matthew Henry makes a great observation about the heart being far from God. “it is in the main matter; Their heart is far from God, habitually alienated and estranged, actually wandering and dwelling upon something else; no serious thoughts of God, no pious affections toward him, no concern about the soul and eternity, no thoughts agreeable to the service. God is near in their mouth, but far from their reins. The heart, with the fool's eyes, is in the ends of the earth. It is a silly dove that is without a heart, and so it is a silly duty. A hypocrite says one thing, but thinks another. The great thing that God looks at and requires is the heart (Pro. 23:26); if that be far from him, it is not a reasonable service and therefore not an acceptable one; it is the sacrifice of fools,

Mat. 6:21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Mat. 12:34 O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.

a) Your actions reveal your heart nature

You may be able to come in here on a Sunday or Wednesday and pray just right you maybe able to quote scripture and be considered a walking Bible, but you act different out there then you do in here, I would have to question your salvation. Now I know everyone has a bad day and we are in the flesh, but if your actions have not changed from when you were saved, a check up is needed.

17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

2 Co 5:17.

If your reputation in the community is no better then the heathen down the street, I would seriously be searching my heart. Our actions speak louder than our words. I can say I love you to my wife every min. of every day, but if I do not show her how much I love her, she would soon doubt it. Your heart is deceitful and desperately wicked.

Mat_15:19 For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:

b) Your attitude reveals your heart condition

Not only is your actions a tell, tell sign of your heart, but your attitude is a great indicator of your heat.

How is your attitude towards the membership of the church? Do you grumble and complain about everything? Do you gossip and laugh at others? Not only in here but in the community? If you can answer yes to one of these, I would be coming down here this morning and asking God to soften your heart. Ask Him to give you a right heart.

Gen 27:41 And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father blessed him: and Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then will I slay my brother Jacob.

Lev 19:17 Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him

Ezekiel 11:19 KJV 1900

And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh:

Ezekiel 36:26 KJV 1900

A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.

Mat 22:37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind

Your actions when you are alone, revel a lot about how your nature . When placed in comparison to God’s Word how does your heart measure up. Your attitude toward the things of God really reveal just how close your heart is to the things of God. O How actions and attitudes need to match with our words and our worship. Our testimony is not just something we give when asked, our testimony encompasses our entire lives. God is interested in the internal and the real. We are far more interested in the external and the image. Is your relationship with God just external and your service just an image?

Three questions that need to be asked this morning:

1. Our lives tell a lot about us, eventually it will reveal how we truly feel about something. How do you feel about the things of God?

2. Taking what Biblical truth was just given, can your words and worship be matched with your actions and attitude?

3. If you are here tonight without Christ as your Savior, it does not matter how much you try and fix your life, until you allow God to come into your life, you will never truly live a life that is pleasing to God. Do you know Him tonight?

Rom_10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.

Rom_10:10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Is thy heart right with God. Washed in the crimson flood.

Cleansed and made holy, humble and lowly. Right in the sight of God