Guarding your heart sounds like a topic centered around love. However the plan emphasized how important it is to guard your heart from all things that can bring you away from God. I think this is the point most people miss, its not always about romance but a lot of things can enter our hearts and destroy our relationships with others.
Proverbs 4:23 says "Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life."
I've read this verse many times but failed to see how serious and heavy the words are. "for it determines the course of your life" The conditions of our hearts determines the course of our lives, how crazy is that? Some people may think this is exaggerated and what not but if you really think about it, is it not true? Whatever we hold dear in our hearts really does affect the things we do, the words we say and the values we hold.
The plan compares our hearts to the White House. The stuff that goes on in the White House is so important to our country that people are trained to monitor who and what gets let in and out of it. Every crack, every little tiny bit of detail matters because that's how important the White House and those who live in it are. Our hearts is the temple of God. The Holy Spirit dwells in there, is he not as important as our President? Is he not MORE important than our president? But how often do we actually monitor who comes and goes from our hearts, how often do we check on the cracks and little fallen pieces?
I've read this verse many times but failed to see how serious and heavy the words are. "for it determines the course of your life" The conditions of our hearts determines the course of our lives, how crazy is that? Some people may think this is exaggerated and what not but if you really think about it, is it not true? Whatever we hold dear in our hearts really does affect the things we do, the words we say and the values we hold.
The plan compares our hearts to the White House. The stuff that goes on in the White House is so important to our country that people are trained to monitor who and what gets let in and out of it. Every crack, every little tiny bit of detail matters because that's how important the White House and those who live in it are. Our hearts is the temple of God. The Holy Spirit dwells in there, is he not as important as our President? Is he not MORE important than our president? But how often do we actually monitor who comes and goes from our hearts, how often do we check on the cracks and little fallen pieces?
It's so easy to mess up that little heart of ours. We can do things out of love, receive a bit of praise for it and all of a sudden our pride takes over and everything we do from that point on is self-glorifying rather than God-glorifying. Or how about a boyfriend just innocently going to his girlfriend's best friend for advice on how to make his girlfriend happy and from that innocent friendship develops a deeper connection that can ruin the friendship of all 3 parties.
Like the plan says it takes attentive care to constantly guard our hearts from things that can harm ourselves and others.One thing that stuck out to me was the part that says "we must constantly guard our hearts, not just against traps and temptations but by reading the Bible and seeking the Lord in meditation and prayer." This is probably a given for every christian but it is actually really hard to do. But spending time with God is the BEST way to stay away from sin. When you are so well rooted in the word of the Lord, it is much easier for you to say no to satan. It's just like how Jesus used scripture to turn satan down in the desert, thats how we must do things.
Personally guarding my heart is a huge struggle for me. I let everyone and everything in and when cracks start appearing I ignore it until a chunk falls off. But by then, I'm already at a place where a lot of time will be needed before I can fully heal. Because I don't rely on God for most of my struggles, my struggles brought me down and left me in place very far from God. But that's what it took for me to learn my lesson and I'm still in that process of learning and healing.
Living a Christ centered life may be a lot of work but hey, it's all worth it in the end. Nothing can bring you more joy than God and when you live for him, amazing things happen.
Psalm 37:4 says "Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart."
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