FISH Sandwiches

The heart.  It must be the most talked about, analysed and romanticised part of us, and for good reason.  After all, the two most important things we’ll ever do in life require our heart: we need it to find God, and we need it to love God.  The Bible says,

“You will seek me [God] and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” (Jer 29:13, NIV)
“Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deut 6:5, NIV)

More than anything else, it’s the heart that God’s interested in – after all, it’s who a person really is.  Someone who has a generous heart is, by necessity, generous, while someone with a deceitful heart is, well, deceitful.  How we see our hearts, then, is how we see ourselves – Prov 27:19 says, “As water reflects a face, so a man’s heart reflects the man.” (NIV)

Many people view their heart based on a verse from Jeremiah:
“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.  Who can understand it?” (Jer 17:9, NIV)

That’s not a very consoling thought; in fact, it’s somewhat bleak.  Because if our hearts are ‘beyond cure’, what hope do we have?

But God’s answer to a deceitful heart has always been, and still is, in a sense, a heart transplant.  He says to the Israelites in the book of Ezekiel:

“I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.” (Eze 11:19, NIV)
“Cast away from you all the transgressions which you have committed, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit…” (Eze 18:31, NIV)

A new heart and a new spirit are at the start of our transformation into new life.  For whoever is in Christ “… is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”  (2 Cor 5:17, NIV)  That includes a new heart – and a good one at that, which we’ll need if we’re going to grow in God.

Jesus confirmed the possibility, and indeed the necessity, of us having a good heart when he explained the Parable of the Sower.  Without a such a heart, we would not be able to take in and understand his words.  He said:

“But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.” (Lk 8:15, NIV)

And perhaps it’s because we have a new heart – a noble and good one – that God’s willing to fulfil its desires.  So he says in Psalms: “Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” (Ps 37:4, NIV)

If God’s happy to go with our hearts, then perhaps they’re good enough.

– Joey