BASIC WORD GROWING IN LIFE BY KNOWING THE HEART

                                         GROWING IN LIFE BY KNOWING THE HEART

Scripture Reading: Matt. 5:3, 8; 6:21; 11:29; 12:34-35; 13:15, 19; 15:8; 22:37; Heb. 4:12; James 4:8; 1 Pet. 3:4; Ezek. 36:26; Jer. 17:9

CHRIST BEING SOWN INTO THE BELIEVERS’ SPIRIT IN ORDER TO GROW IN THEIR HEART

Matthew 1 through 4 shows that Christ is God incarnated to be everything to us, and chapter 5 shows that the way to receive Him is to be poor in spirit. As we have seen, the first item that the Lord mentioned in Matthew 5, at the beginning of His teaching, was the human spirit, because our human spirit is the organ for us to receive the Lord. In verse 3 the Lord said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” To be poor in spirit means that we are empty and unloaded in our spirit. When we are full in our spirit, there is no room for Christ, but when we are poor in spirit, Christ is able to come into us.

Matthew 5:8 says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” After we receive Christ into our spirit, we need to be pure in heart because our heart is the field where Christ can grow and spread. The heart is composed of the mind, emotion, and will of the soul plus the conscience as the main part of the spirit. Christ has been sown into our spirit in order to grow and spread in our heart. According to 1 Peter 3:4, our spirit is the hidden man of our heart. If we represent our heart by a circle, our spirit will be the center of that circle. Thus, our spirit is the center of our heart. Christ desires to spread from the center of our heart to its circumference. He desires to make His home in our heart and to take possession of every part of our inner being (Eph. 3:17). The growth in life is the spreading of Christ in our heart.

The problem that limits the growth of many believers is not in their spirit but in their heart. All the believers have received Christ in their spirit. As we have seen, in the Gospel of Matthew there are three main points concerning our spirit. First, we need to be poor in spirit in order to receive Christ (5:3); second, we need to call “Lord Jesus” in spirit (22:43); and third, we need to go along with our willing spirit (26:41). We should never stand with our weak flesh but should always exercise our willing spirit.

The Problems Related to the Growth in Life Being Mainly with the Believers’ Heart

The Gospel of Matthew speaks more concerning the heart than it does concerning the spirit. This confirms that the problems with the believers’ growth in life is not mainly with their spirit but with their heart. According to Matthew 5:8, in order to see God, we need a pure heart. If we lack spiritual revelation, light, and sight, this indicates that our heart is impure. In order for us to see God, we need to be pure, single, in our heart. To be pure in heart is to be single in purpose, to have the single goal of accomplishing God’s will for God’s glory (1 Cor. 10:31).

Matthew 6:21 says, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” On the one hand, where our heart is depends on where our treasure is; hence, we need to send our treasure to heaven so that our heart also can be in heaven (v. 20). On the other hand, where our heart is depends on what we treasure. If we treasure education, clothing, or money, our heart will be where those things are. Likewise, if we treasure Christ, our heart will be set on Christ.

In Matthew 11:29 the Lord Jesus said, “I am meek and lowly in heart.” The Lord did not resist opposition, nor did He have self-esteem. Instead, throughout all the opposition that He faced, the Lord was meek, and throughout all the rejection, He was lowly in heart.

Matthew 12:34-35 says, “Offspring of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man, out of his good treasure, brings forth good things, and the evil man, out of his evil treasure, brings forth evil things.” These verses reveal that a man’s speaking is the expression of what is in his heart. That is, the heart is the source, whereas the mouth is the expression. In order to have a proper expression, we need to deal with the source. When our heart is improper, it will be difficult to have a proper expression, but when we deal with our heart, our mouth will be right.

Matthew 13:15 says, “The heart of this people has become fat, and with their ears they have heard heavily, and their eyes they have closed, lest they perceive with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart, and they turn around, and I will heal them.” The religious Jews could not understand with their heart because their heart had become proud and was full of earthly things. Although they saw and heard the Lord, they closed their eyes, and with their ears they heard heavily. Thus, they had no way to turn and be healed by the Lord. In order to turn and receive the Lord’s healing, we need to deal with the earthly things in our heart, which are depicted in the first three types of soil in the parable of the sower (vv. 18-22).

Matthew 15:8 says, “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart stays far away from Me.” Here, as in 12:34-35, the Lord was pointing out that what matters is not our mouth, our lips, but our heart. Our heart is the source. Thus, what defiles a person is what issues out of his heart (15:17-20).

Matthew 22:37 says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” All these verses show how crucial our heart is in our relationship with the Lord. In essence, if we have a problem with our heart or if our heart is wrong, the Lord will have no way to spread within us. In the  parable of the sower in Matthew 13, the Lord made it clear that the seed was unable to grow in the first three kinds of hearts because they had no room for the seed to grow and spread. If Christ as the seed of life is to grow in our heart, we need to have a pure and unoccupied heart, a heart in which every inch is given to Christ so that He can spread within us. His spreading is the growth in life.