Introduction to the Heart – What Is the Heart in the Bible? Guarding Your Heart and Its Treasure

I’m going to do something that I very rarely do. I’m going to try to make a few introductory remarks and then leave it there. I hope I make it. It’s just introductory. Would you turn with me to Proverbs? This is Proverbs 4:23: “Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flows the springs of life.” Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flows the springs of life. That is really, really heavy.

Hebrews 13:9: “Do not be carried away by varied and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, through which those who were thus occupied were not benefited.” The heart can be strengthened, but I prefer a better translation: the heart can be established by grace. The heart is established by grace.

1 Thessalonians 3:13 bears this out too, that the heart can be established by grace. This is the same word. “So that he may establish your hearts unblameably in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all the saints, so that he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before your God.” It is quite a thing the Lord has set out to do: to establish our hearts unblameably.

Three weeks ago, I began speaking to you about a series of things and how the Lord might deal with us. The first thing we discovered was God’s creation. He made man in three parts—body, soul, and spirit. Then man fell. And we saw the damage that had come into man’s body. It became flesh. Man’s soul became enlarged. Man’s spirit became dead.

The man got indwelt in his body by sin, and his body became flesh. Now then, after I become a Christian, I have to have my flesh dealt with. When I get converted, I have enough of the Lord Jesus Christ in me at my conversion for my flesh to be completely dealt with. We touched on about two or three things, and a sister talked to me Thursday night and brought out one I hadn’t mentioned or thought of, but that is also there. There are three or four things that may be actually actively in our lives at conversion. A question was asked about immorality. There may be active immorality that’s therefore in the body which has become flesh. But what about the lust toward immorality? That’s in the soul, because it’s in the mind. But the active engagement of immorality has got to go at the time of conversion. Then active addiction has got to go. It’s got to go. If it doesn’t, you’ll be frustrated in your Christian growth.

Now, sisters, brothers, some of us weren’t told that when we first got converted, and we went on in active addiction. So, you’ve got to come back and start all over again. And this calls for a renewed heart. I mentioned that, and a lot of brothers and sisters said, “Yeah, talk about that.” But I said, no, later. If you missed out on this when you first got converted, and you didn’t take care immediately of the things of the flesh, you’re going to have to come back to a renewed heart. And I just said in passing, I would encourage you to come right back at the beginning and be baptized and drop the things of the world. How many of you got baptized? May I see your hands?

Then you must deal with the addictions that are in the flesh. You have enough of the Lord’s life to do it. It is His grace that does it. You’ve got it at conversion, and you can drop it. Amen.

Well, there is also the work of the flesh and the soul. Not the work of the body and the soul, but the active work of sin that is in our soul. We looked at Galatians 4, talked about a lot of this, and moved from the flesh to the soul. Well, by the way, that thing the sister mentioned the other night was gluttony that is also in the flesh. It’s got to go.

Well, I don’t want to get off too personally on this, but it is there. How do you break gluttony? I think there are two or three ways you don’t do it. You don’t do it by going on a diet. You’re looking at a man who’s lost over a thousand pounds in his lifetime. My average weight from the time I was, I guess, right after I was converted until about 1965 or 66, I guess, was around 200. I just lost an incredible amount of weight in my lifetime. And I didn’t do it by going on a diet. I’m not going to say more about it than that, but it is something that the Lord can handle, the Lord can deal with. Praise the Lord.

Now then, we talked about the soul. We spent quite a bit of time on the soul. One day, we’re going to come back to the human soul and take a look at it a little bit more. Well, I have a very distinct impression the Lord really touched us a great deal on this, but I’m just going to touch on it again for a moment and say to you, brothers and sisters, well, maybe I just started reading it. It’s just easier to read out of the New Testament.

Galatians 5:19. Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are immorality, that’s of the body, impurity of the body, sensuality of the body, idolatry, all of the body, sorcery of the body, of the flesh in the body. Now then, we come to the soul. Enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envies. You can cut out drunkenness and carousing; those go back to the body. Things like these, of which I warned you before, and I warn you that those who continually do those things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. So the Lord breaks this continual practice in our lives. If he doesn’t, we’re not going to inherit the kingdom of God. I have no more comment about that than that, except there’s a difference between getting converted and inheriting the kingdom of God.